Disasters with highest death tolls
2002 Indian Heat Wave
India
More than 1,030 people were killed in the 2002 heatwave in south India. Most of the dead were poor and elderly and a majority of deaths occurred in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh. In districts that were impacted most, the heat was so severe that ponds and rivers evaporated and in those same districts birds had fallen from the sky and animals were collapsing from the intense heat.