Climate & Environment in the 18th century

106 sourced entries, 1700 CE to 1797 CE, oldest first. Also see Climate & Environment across every century or everything else in the 18th century.

• 1700January 26 – At approximately 9 p.m., the Cascadia earthquake occurs in the Pacific Northwest, with an estimated moment magnitude of 8.7–9.2. This megathrust earthquake ruptures about 1000 km mi of the Cascadia Subduction Zone and causes a tsunami that strikes the coast of Japan approximately 10 hours later.source
• 1700September 13-14 – The Rising-sun hurricane of 1700 strikes the coast of South Carolina, killing 98.source
• 1700Approximate date – Lions become extinct in Libya.source
• 1702March 14 – An earthquake in the middle of the Calore valley in Italy, east of Benevento, kills 400 people.source
• 1702April 14 – Volcanic eruption of Changbaishan volcano (also known as Paektu Mountain) on the China/Korea border takes place.source
• 1703January 14 – 1703 Apennine earthquakes: The magnitude 6.7 Norcia earthquake affects Central Italy with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI (Extreme). With a death toll of 6,240–9,761, it is the first in a sequence of three destructive events.source
• 1703January 16 – 1703 Apennine earthquakes: The magnitude 6.2 Montereale earthquake causes damage at Accumoli, Armatrice, Cittareale and Montereale, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII (Severe).source
• 1703February 2 – 1703 Apennine earthquakes: The magnitude 6.7 L'Aquila earthquake affects Central Italy, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme). In the final large event (an example of Coulomb stress transfer), damage occurs as far distant as Rome, with landslides, liquefaction, slope failures and at least 2,500 deaths.source
• 1703December 7–10 (November 26–29 O.S.) – The Great Storm of 1703, an extratropical cyclone, ravages southern England and the English Channel, killing at least 8,000, mostly at sea. The Eddystone Lighthouse off Plymouth is destroyed in the storm together with its designer Henry Winstanley and many buildings on land are damaged.source
• 1704July – Daniel Defoe documents the Great Storm of 1703 in England, with eyewitness testimonies, in The Storm.source
• 1704An earthquake strikes Gondar, Ethiopia.source
• 1704Tenerife's earliest recorded volcanic eruption takes place from three fissure emission centres: Siete Fuentes, Fasnia and Arafo.source
• 1705August 16–18 – In an Atlantic tropical cyclone across Cuba and Florida, four ships are lost and there are many casualties.source
• 1705November 24 – An earthquake is recorded in Syria, northeast of Damascus.source
• 1707May 23 – The volcanic eruption in the Santorini caldera begins.source
• 1707October 28 – The Hōei earthquake (the most powerful in Japan until 2011) strikes, with an estimated local magnitude of 8.6 and kills at least 5,000 people.source
• 1707December 16 – The last recorded eruption of Mount Fuji begins in Japan.source
• 1709January 6 – Western Europe's Great Frost of 1709, the coldest period in 500 years, begins during the night, lasting three months, with its effects felt for the entire year. In France, the Atlantic coast and Seine River freeze, crops fail, and 24,000 Parisians die. Floating ice enters the North Sea.source
• 1709October 14 – The Chinese region of Ningxia is shaken by a 7.5 earthquake killing more than 2,000 people.source
• 1709Herculaneum, an ancient town in Ercolano, Campania, Italy and buried under volcanic ash and pumice in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD, is discovered by accident when attempts to drill a well for a monastery encountered marble and other materials.source
• 1712September 8 – A severe hurricane buffets Bermuda for eight hours, destroying most of the churches.source
• 1716February 3 – The 1716 Algiers earthquake sequence begins with a 7.0 mainshock that causes severe damage and kills 20,000 in Algeria.source
• 1716February 10 – James Edward Stuart flees from Scotland to France with a handful of supporters, following the failure of the Jacobite rising of 1715.source
• 1716December 12 – Charles Townshend, 2nd Viscount Townshend, is demoted from his office as Secretary of State for the Northern Department in the British government, and replaced by James Stanhope, 1st Earl Stanhope. This is a move towards the Whig Split of 1717.source
• 1717February 26–March 6 – What becomes the northeastern United States is paralyzed by a series of blizzards that bury the region.source
• 1717September 29 – Guatemala earthquake: A 7.4 magnitude earthquake strikes Antigua Guatemala, destroying much of the city, and making authorities consider moving the capital of Guatemala to a different location.source
• 1717December 24–25 – Christmas flood: A disastrous flood hits the North Sea coast, between the Netherlands and Denmark; thousands die or lose their houses.source
• 1717Most recent rupture of New Zealand's Alpine Fault, with an earthquake estimated to have had a magnitude between 7.8 and 8.1.source
• 1718June 19 – A 7.5 earthquake shakes Tongwei County in China, killing 73,000 people.source
• 1719January 8 – Carolean Death March begins: A catastrophic retreat by a largely-Finnish Swedish-Carolean army under the command of Carl Gustaf Armfeldt across the Tydalen mountains in a blizzard kills around 3,700 men and cripples a further 600 for life.source
• 1719March 6 – A serious earthquake (estimated magnitude >7) in El Salvador results in large fractures, liquefaction zones, and a sulphuric gas leak. It destroys houses, churches and monasteries.source
• 1719May 25 – An earthquake in Turkey damages İzmit and Istanbul, damaging some city walls and ruining mosques and palaces.source
• 1722September 23 – La Nouvelle-Orléans (New Orleans), recently established by France as the capital of the Louisiana Territory is hit by what is later called the "Great Hurricane of 1722", starting with 7 ft high waves, followed by winds in excess of 100 mph. By September 24, "Almost every public building in New Orleans, from the hospital to the cathedral" is "either unroofed or totally ruined."source
• 1726September 16 – An earthquake strikes Sicily and kills 226 people in Palermo.source
• 1726November – Mary Toft allegedly gives birth to 16 rabbits in England; the story is later revealed to be a hoax.source
• 1727November 18 – Tabriz earthquake, Persia kills 77,000.source
• 1730July 8 – 1730 Valparaíso earthquake: An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 9.1 strikes Valparaíso, in modern-day Chile but at this time in the Viceroyalty of Peru.source
• 1730September 1 – A volcano erupts on Lanzarote, the easternmost of the Canary Islands and threatens the Spanish inhabitants. On Gran Canaria, the regent of the islands reports to Madrid that the flames are visible even from 130 mi away.source
• 1732September 16 – The magnitude 5.8 Montreal earthquake occurs in Quebec (New France).source
• 1732November 29 – The magnitude 6.6 Irpinia earthquake causes deaths in the former Kingdom of Naples.source
• 1733July 15 – A hurricane off of the coast of the Florida Keys wrecks at least 17 Spanish ships.source
• 1737October 7 – At least 300,000 people are killed when a tropical cyclone strikes the Bay of Bengal in India and modern-day Bangladesh. The storm sends 12 m high waves over the Sundarbans delta, and overflows the Hooghly River.source
• 1737October 16 – An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 9.3 occurs off the shore of Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula. Tsunamis up to 60 m ft high follow in the Pacific ocean.source
• 1739January 3 – A 7.6 earthquake shakes the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region in China killing 50,000 people.source
• 173984,000 farmers revolt in the province of Iwaki in Japan.source
• 1739A Plinian eruption of Mount Tarumae volcano occurs in Japan.source
• 1741August 23 – At least 2,000 die along the shores of the Sea of Japan after a volcanic eruption on an island generated the Kampo Tsunami.source
• 1743January 12 – An earthquake strikes the Philippinessource
• 1746October 28 – An earthquake demolishes Lima and Callao, in Peru.source
• 1747October 24 – A Caribbean Sea hurricane sweeps across Saint Kitts, sinking 12 British freighters and one from France.source
• 1747December 13 – The ordeal of the Maryland freighter sloop Endeavour begins when the ship departs Annapolis for the West Indies and encounters a hurricane. With its masts and rigging torn away, the ship drifts for six months before finally ending up at the island of Tiree off the coast of Scotlandsource
• 1750June 19 – At a time when mountain climbing is still relatively uncommon, Eggert Ólafsson and Bjarni Pálsson scale their first peak, the 4892 foot high Icelandic volcano, Hekla.source
• 1752July 30 - An earthquake occurred in Edirne and affected the region all the way to Bulgaria.source
• 1752November 3 – A hurricane destroys the Spanish settlement on Florida's Santa Rosa Island, leaving only two buildings standing; the remaining residents decide to move from the barrier island on the Gulf of Mexico and to start a settlement on the nearby mainland and construct the Presidio San Miguel de Panzacola, which later forms the nucleus of the city of Pensacola, Florida.source
• 1754September 2 – A powerful earthquake strikes Constantinople shortly after 9 o'clock in the evening. A Scottish physician, Mordach Mackenzie, reports in a letter that the tremor damaged or destroyed numerous buildings and comments, "Some say there were 2000 people destroyed by this calamity, in the town and suburbs; some 900; and others reduce them to 60, who, by what I have seen, are nearer the truth."source
• 1755September 2 – A powerful hurricane strikes the east coast of the British colony of North Carolina, killing 150 people and sinking five British and colonial merchant ships at Portsmouth Island.source
• 1755October 17 – The Mount Katla volcano erupts in Iceland and continues ejecting ash for the next 120 days, finally ceasing on February 13. An estimated 1.5 cubic kilometers (1.5 billion cubic meters or 53 billion cubic feet) of tephra is discharged by the volcano.source
• 1755November 1 – More than 40,000 people are killed by the 8.5 magnitude earthquake in Lisbon, Portuguese Empire. The tremor begins at 9:40 in the morning local time off of the Atlantic coast of Portugal and sends a tsunami that strikes the coasts of Portugal, Spain and Morocco.source
• 1755November 18 – The 1755 Cape Ann earthquake occurs in the vicinity of Cape Ann, Massachusetts, causing extensive damage.source
• 1756King Frederick the Great of Prussia forces his country's peasants to grow the unpopular and obscure potato.source
• 1759October 30 – Near East earthquakes of 1759: The first event in an earthquake doublet occurs to the north of the Sea of Galilee, with a surface wave magnitude of 6.6 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII–IX (Severe–Violent). About 2,000 are killed in Safed.source
• 1759November 25 – Near East earthquakes of 1759: The second and stronger event in an earthquake doublet occurs to the east of Beirut, with a surface wave magnitude of 7.4 and a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent), destroying all the villages in the Beqaa Valley.source
• 1760July 3 – A lightning strike causes a major fire at Portsmouth Royal Dockyard in England.source
• 1761February 8 – An earthquake in London breaks chimneys in Limehouse and Poplar.source
• 1761March 8 – A second earthquake occurs in North London, Hampstead and Highgate.source
• 1761March 31 – An 8.5 magnitude earthquake strikes Lisbon in the Kingdom of Portugal, with effects felt as far north as Scotland, but few deaths are reported because of censorship by the Portuguese government.source
• 1761May 4 – The first multiple death tornado in the 13 American colonies strikes Charleston, South Carolina, killing eight people and sinking five ships in harbor.source
• 1761November 11 – The Earl of Egremont, serving as Secretary of State for the Southern Department, initiated a policy which forbids the issuing of any land grants to white settlers in territory occupied by the American Indian tribes.source
• 1762April 2 – A powerful earthquake along the border between modern-day Bangladesh and Myanmar causes a tsunami in the Bay of Bengal that kills at least 200 people.source
• 1763June 28 – A magnitude 6.2 earthquake shakes Hungary and Slovakia, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of IX (Violent). Damage is limited, but 83 are killed.source
• 1763Little Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, Ottoman Empire, is damaged in an earthquake.source
• 1764June 29 – One of the strongest tornadoes ever recorded hits Woldegk, Germany.source
• 1764Voltaire - Dictionnaire philosophiquesource
• 1766August 13 – A hurricane sweeps across the French island colony of Martinique, killing more than 400 people and destroying the plantation owned by Joseph-Gaspard de La Pagerie, the father of the future French Empress Joséphine.source
• 1768April 4 – The Cotopaxi volcano erupts in what is now Ecuador, at the time part of the Spanish Viceroyalty of Nueva Granada, covering the towns of Hambato and Tacunga with ash, but not causing fatalities.source
• 1768October 15 – A powerful hurricane sweeps across Cuba during the Festival of Santa Teresa, killing hundreds of people. Spain's King Carlos III begins a precedent of ordering the colonial government to fund disaster relief, a task previously left to the Catholic Church.source
• 1768The Steller's sea cow, discovered on Bering Island in 1741, is driven to extinction.source
• 1769September – Massive droughts in Bengal lead to the Bengal famine of 1770, in which ten million people, a third of the population, will die, the worst natural disaster in human history (in terms of lives lost).source
• 1770June 3 – The 7.5 Port-au-Prince earthquake affects the French colony of Saint-Domingue with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (Extreme), killing 250 or more.source
• 1772August 12 – The volcano Mount Papandayan in West Java erupts and partially collapses, the debris avalanche killing several thousand.source
• 1773July 29 (Feast of St Martha) – Guatemala earthquake: The Santa Marta earthquake hits, with an estimated epicentral magnitude of 7.5 M i , striking Guatemala; numerous aftershocks last until December. The city of Antigua Guatemala is virtually destroyed, leading to the decision to move the country's capital to La Nueva Guatemala de la Asunción.source
• 1774To avoid severe flooding, Martinsborough, North Carolina is moved to higher ground 3 mi km west. The North Carolina General Assembly incorporates Martinsborough as the new seat of Pitt County, 3 years after its founding.source
• 1775August 29 – September 12 – The Independence Hurricane from South Carolina to Nova Scotia kills 4,170, mostly fishermen and sailors.source
• 1775Typhoon Liengkieki devastates the Pacific atoll of Pingelap.source
• 1776September 6 – A hurricane hits Guadeloupe, killing more than 6,000 people.source
• 1780May 19 – New England's Dark Day: An unaccountable darkness spreads over New England, regarded by some observers as a fulfillment of Bible prophecy.source
• 1780October 10–16 – The Great Hurricane flattens the islands of Barbados, Martinique and Sint Eustatius; 22,000 are killed.source
• 1783February 5 – 1783 Calabrian earthquakes: The first of a sequence of five earthquakes strikes Calabria, Italy (February 5–7, March 1 & 28), leaving 50,000 dead.source
• 1783June 8 – The volcano Laki in Iceland begins an 8-month eruption, starting the chain of natural disasters known as the Móðuharðindin, killing tens of thousands throughout Europe, including up to 33% of Iceland's population, and causing widespread famine. It has been described as one of "the greatest environmental catastrophes in European history".source
• 1783August 4 – Mount Asama, the most active volcano in Japan, begins a climactic eruption, killing roughly 1,400 people directly and exacerbating a famine, resulting in another 20,000 deaths (Tenmei eruption).source
• 1783November 29 – 1783 New Jersey earthquake: An earthquake of 5.3 magnitude strikes New Jersey.source
• 1784Great Tenmei famine in Edo period Japan continues, as 300,000 die of starvation.source
• 1785June 3 – The United States' Continental Navy is disbanded.source
• 1786June 10 – An earthquake-caused landslide dam on the Dadu River gives way, killing 100,000 in the Sichuan province of China.source
• 1786September 2 – A hurricane strikes Barbados.source
• 1787The North Carolina General Assembly incorporates Waynesborough, and designates it the seat for Wayne County, North Carolina. The town becomes extinct after 1865.source
• 1788July 13 – A hailstorm sweeps across France and the Dutch Republic, with hailstones 'as big as quart bottles' that take 'three days to melt'; immense damage is done.source
• 1788November 25 – Fifty consecutive days of temperatures below freezing strike France, a record that will be unbroken more than 200 years later.source
• 1790October 10 – At least 3,000 people die in Algeria when an earthquake and tsunami strikes the city of Oran. The city is destroyed and Spanish forces eventually flee in 1792.source
• 1792May 21 – 1792 Unzen earthquake and tsunami: An old lava dome collapses in Kyūshū, Japan, due to activity of Mount Unzen volcano; the resulting avalanche and tsunami kill about 14,300 people.source
• 1793Eli Whitney invents a cotton gin. This causes a resurgence of slavery in the South.source
• 1794June–July – Mount Vesuvius erupts in Italy; the town of Torre del Greco is destroyed.source
• 1795January – Central England records its coldest ever month, in the CET records dating back to 1659.source
• 1795December 13 – Wold Cottage meteorite: A meteorite falls at Wold Newton, a hamlet in Yorkshire in England. This meteorite fall is subsequently used as a literary premise by science fiction writer Philip José Farmer, as the basis for the Wold Newton family.source
• 1796June 6–7 – Ragunda lake in Sweden bursts and drains completely, leaving the Döda fallet dry.source
• 1797February 4 – The Riobamba earthquake in Ecuador, estimated magnitude 8.3, causes up to 40,000 casualties.source