Welcome back to Disaster Discourse Monthly!
Welcome back to Disaster Discourse Monthly. At Hagerty, we hope you had a safe holiday season and wish you a healthy New Year. This month, we offer updates regarding the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccine distribution, an eruption on Hawaii’s Big Island, and the bombing that occurred on Christmas morning in Nashville.
The COVID-19 Pandemic…
The United States (US) has reported that over 19.5 million people have been infected with COVID-19 while globally over 1,780,000 have died from the virus. On Tuesday, December 28 the US reported the first case of the COVID-19 variant that has been spreading throughout the United Kingdom. Scientists believe that this new variant is more contagious than previously identified strains of COVID-19. However, it is believed that the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines still protect against this new variant.
The US starts Pfizer and Moderna Vaccine distribution…
On December 14, the US administered its first COVID-19 vaccine which was given to a critical care nurse in New York City. The vaccine, developed by Pfizer, is one of two vaccines that is being administered throughout the US to healthcare workers and senior citizens. So far, more than 2.1 million doses have been administered throughout the US and US territories.
Hawaii’s Big Island experiences an eruption of Kilauea, an active shield volcano…
On December 21st, the US Geological Survey (USGS) confirmed that an eruption had occurred of the active shield volcano, Kīlauea, on Hawaii’s Big Island. This occurred after the USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory (HVO) recorded a magnitude-4.4 earthquake beneath Kīlauea Volcano’s south flank on Sunday, December 20. In 2018, Kīlauea erupted with lava flowing from May through August, resulting in a Presidential Disaster Declaration after destroying over 700 homes and residential areas in the Puna District, southeast of the Waiakea Forest Reserve on the Big Island, according to the National Park Service (NPS).
Explosion in Nashville kills one, injures three…
On the morning of December 25, a bomb went off in Nashville, Tennessee killing the suspected bomber and injuring three. The explosion damaged infrastructure surrounding the blast sight and caused service outages of wireless networks, business services, and consumer broadband and entertainment throughout Alabama, Kentucky, and Tennessee and briefly grounding planes at Nashville International Airport due to disruptions to flight control systems.The motive for the explosion is currently being investigated.
Thanks for reading. We’ll see you next month and stay healthy!