Mega Disasters

Using archive footage, computer animation, and expert interviews, we expose the killer characteristics of natural disasters, leading to an ultimate disaster – a hypothetical event of unparalleled force and impact.

Investigating the ‘big four’ of natural disasters: tornadoes, volcanoes, earthquakes and tsunamis, “Mega Disasters” take viewers beyond the news footage, beyond the aftermath, and on a tour of the anatomy of these mega events to understand their genesis and the multitude of factors that contribute to their subsequent impact. Some of the world’s leading experts on each natural phenomenon provide analysis and insight into how some of Planet Earth’s titanic upheavals can result in something so deadly and cause such widespread damage.

But the science only provides part of the story. The impact of these events can only be truly understood by the testimony of survivors who bear first hand witness to nature’s awesome power. We talk to people who have stared disaster in the eye and have lived to tell the tale.

The disasters we profile may seem to be nature’s extreme end-point. It is possible to theorise that events as devastating as the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 or the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami may be the worst that the earth can throw at the human race. But experts disagree, and even the deadliest event can be superseded by forces of greater magnitude or impact.

In the final act of each Mega Disaster episode we construct a disaster scenario, using expert information and brought to life with astounding computer graphics, an event of such scale, enormity and power, it will eclipse all other disasters – truly a mega disaster.