The Year End Report
Published by: Edward Era Barbacena
The twin year year of 2020 is probably one of the most obscured year in the passed decades. Indeed, it is the year that is not good to remember but history will tell that 2020 has left scars to every people in every nation that simply can't be removed. It is one the most dreadful year that the signs of heaven are apparent that reveals different disasters and tragedies as it was foretold that would take place during the identical year of the 21st century.
2020 has brought us 10 plagues among men of the modern civilization that the government of each nation grappled in order to endure the hardships. These plagues has brought the so-called "new normal " that altered the human way of living. In the identical year, men experienced the 1. Ravaged of coronavirus, 2. The wrath of global volcanic eruptions, 3. The devastating earthquakes, 4. The stronger hurricanes and typhoons, 5. Unexpected floods, 6. The pestilence of locusts, 7.The destructive wildfires, 8.The mysterious deaths of wildlife animals, 9.The anarchy and social unrest, 10.And the worst of all, the rise of racism and white supremacists. These plagues had caused millions of lives and brought oppressions among the most vulnerable ones and the world will never be the same again.
1 .The ravages of coronavirus
Up to this day, the world is coping to the scourges of the covid-19. It is the most deadly global pandemic that swept the world since the black plague of the 12th century. It is much deadlier than the spanish flue and the influence pandemic of the 20th century and far more grim than the plague of London in the 15th century.
The horrendous novel coronavirus started in far east asia that has reached the coast of the United States. The first case of the novel coronavirus or covid-19 ( SARS - COV 2 ) was detected in December of 2019 in Wuhan, China. It slowly encroaches the world. Different government of different nations had to imposed travel restrictions, lockdowns, and different preventive measures such as social distancing and wearing masks. Despite of this measures to avoid contagion, the covid-19 pandemic had spread all throughout the world leaving 80.7 infected and 1.7 fatalities as of December 27, 2020. The United States has the most number of cases of more than 19 million and fatalities of more than 330,000. Now the world is facing another threat from the coronavirus. Last year, around December, the covid-19 emerged from Wuhan, China and last November, the variant coronavirus emerges from the United Kingdom and started infecting people in the southeastern part of England. It is not yet known if this mutated covid-19 will respond to the newly developed covid-19 vaccines.
2. The wrath of volcanic eruptions
As the coronavirus virus emerges, a new threat has shocked the world and that is the eruptions of different volcanoes around the world. All in all, there are recorded 67 eruptions that occurred in 2020.https://volcano.si.edu/faq/index.cfm?question=eruptionsbyyear&checkyear=2020
Most of these volcanoes are stratovolcanoes and located in the ring of fire. The first volcanoes to erupt are Popocatepet of Mexico, Mt Shitake of Japan and Taal volcano of the Philippines. The eruptions didn't cause casualties but it cost millions of dollars worth of properties.
3. Destructive earthquakes
2020 is not spared from the wrath of deadly earthquakes. The earthquakes are usually counted by the intensify or numbers of magnitude. 7.0 to 7.9, there were 9 recorded earthquakes, 6.0 to 6.9 there were 109 registered earthquakes, 5.0 to 5.9 there were 1,298 recorded earthquakes and 4.0 to 4.9, there were around 12,033 recorded earthquakes around the world. Most of these earthquakes were associated with volcanic eruptions and activities. The most destructive earthquake that occurred in 2020 was on October 30, when a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit the Aegean sea that jolted Greece and Turkey causing mini tsunami and building to collapse in different cities that killed 118 people.
4. The plague of locusts
This is probably the most peculiar and iconic of all plagues next to the coronavirus pandemic. Many people have associated this to the biblical or scriptural plague of locusts in the time of exodus in egypt. The pestilence of locusts is one thing in common of both plagues occurred in the time of moses and in 2020. The desert locusts, or schistocerca gregaria have often referred to as the world's most devastating pests, and for some good reason. Swarm form when locusts' number increase and become very crowded. As they travel, they devour any form of vegetation and çrops causing millions of dollars of damages and shortages of food supplies. This has become a great concern of WHO when the plague of locusts hit Saudi Arabia, Oman,Ethiopia, Uganda, Yemen, Somalia, Iran, Pakistan, Eritrea and India on the that occurred from July to August. On the early part of December, the plague of locusts reappeared in East Africa.
5. Bushfires and wildfires
Australian Bushfires
Australia suffered from the snare of bushfire that started on the june of 2019 and lasted up to the first few months of 2020. This is the season of bushfires or for Australians, it is colloquially known as the "black summer." The intense heat from the sun would usually cause fire to set on dried bushes that would spread rapidly burning acres of trees, trapping and killing animals and burning houses. Approximately, the Australian bushfires have burned 18,636,079 hectares of forest, burned a total of 9,352 buildings including 3500 homes and 5,852 out buildings. The total number of direct deaths was 34 and 445 indirect ( suffocation and inhalation ). The Australian bushfires started from June of 2019 and lasted up to May 2020.
Californian wildfires
The 2020 wildfire season is probably the worst of all wildfires that had ever occurred in California. It is a series of ongoing wildfires that are burning across California. It was the largest wildfires so far. On December 24, there were 9,639 wildfires recorded that have burned 4,359,517 acres
( 1,764, 234 ha ). It has also cost $2,059 billions worth of damages and destroyed a total of 10,488 establishments. Only 34 deaths were recorded.
6. Longer lasting hurricanes, typhoons and cyclones
The atlantic hurricanes in 2020 is considered as the most active and the seventh costliest atlantic hurricane season on the record. The pacific typhoons on the other hand is slightly below average event of the formation of tropical cyclone in the pacific ocean. The north Indian cyclone has no official bounds. Though the weather disturbances occurred in 2020 were not as powerful as compared before, they are more long lasting even if they had made a landfall with powerful winds of up to 150 miles per hour.
There were 6 hurricanes that were recorded. Three of the strongest were Zeta ( cat 3 )that made a landfall on Louisiana on October 28, Eta ( cat 4 ) that hit the Nicaragua and Honduras around November 6 and followed by Iota ( cat 5 ) on November 17- 18. Hurricane Iota was the most destructive of them all. It has brought strong winds with 145 miles per hour with heavy rains that caused floods in different places of Nicaragua and columbia.
In the pacific ocean, there were 10 strong typhoons formed. The most destructive were Molave, Vamco and Goni. These 3 powerful typhoons hammered both the Philippines and Vietnam. Molave was a relatively weak typhoon when it landed on the Philippines on October 25 but it intensified into a category 5 typhoon with gust winds of 155 miles per hour and hit Vietnam on October 28. On November 1, typhoon Goni struck the Philippines. It brought heavy torrential rains that flooded the province of Albay in the Bicol region of Southern Luzon. and the flood went as high as 15ft. and many of the houses were submerged in water and mud. 10 days after, typhoon Vamco made a landfall causing heavy floods in the northern part of the Philippines, particularly the San Mateo,Rizal and the province of isabella were the most affected.
7. Floods
Since January there are series of flooding happened all through out the world. The first occurrence of flood was on January 1 in Jakarta Indonesia. In most cases, flooding was brought by heavy torrential rains during the monsoon season which is more prevalent in Asia. This has caused people to evacuate their homes and went to a higher grounds for safety. Occurrences of floods has become more prevalent in and frequent in 2020 brought by heavy rains. There are three main causes of floods in different places this year. The first is the heavy constant rain, second is storm surge due to powerful storms and third is the tsunami caused by earthquakes. On December 17, eleven people have died in the flood and 7 went missing in Brazil. The flood was caused by heavy constant rain for 24 hours. The city recorded 125 mm of rain . Civil Defence said, there were 1600 were affected by the floods, with 284 displaced.
8. The mysterious deaths of animals
The mysterious deaths of animals of different sorts all over the world have baffled researchers why such unexpected and gruesome deaths of the wild creatures. From fishes and whales the sea - to the poultry and large animals of the land - to the flying creatures of the skies. Since 2000, there are numerous deaths of animals that causes are not yet known. In 2020, every month there are deaths that occurred of different animals that occurred at least twice. Here is the link for the complete list.
https://www.end-times-prophecy.org/animal-deaths-birds-fish-end-times.html
Some have theorized that it is a sign of the pending apocalypse, but others with more scientific idea have blame the cause to the development of 5 G technology, in which towers emit harmful radiations that killed some birds and other animals. The most mysterious deaths of animals in 2020 are the deaths of more than 350 elephants on July 10 in Botswana and six fin whales in France on November 17, 2020
9. The social unrest
The anti-lockdown protests
The lockdowns in different countries in the purpose to control and lessen the transmission of the coronavirus pandemic had resulted to many forms of social unrest and violence. On mid-April 2020, many of the Trump supporters in different states made several protests against the government-imposed lockdowns in response to the growing number covid-19 cases in the United States. This is probably the most lucrative form of protests in the world since the pro-democracy protests ignited in Hong Kong in June 2019. You can actually see protests holding ridiculous signs like " I want my haircut," " Let my people golf," and other insane ideas. The protests were organized by the so-called conservatives and individuals who decried the economic and social impact of stay-at-home orders, business closures and restricted personal movement and association and demanded their respective states be reopened for formal business and personal activity not knowing the risk of further spread of the disease. Many of these protesters accused their respective governors of using communist tactics to control the pandemic and imposing lockdowns to control the pandemic is denying the freedom of the people. Majority of the protesters didn't believe that there was a pandemic, so most of them didn't wear masks and adhere to the social distancing guidelines. Since then, the covid-19 cases in the United States increased rapidly until it has reached millions. Such insane protests made a headline on International news, other countries like Germany, Russia, Brazil, Mexico, Nigeria, Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom also made protests and demanded that the economy to be reopened. The global anti-lockdown protests that began in the United States have caused sudden increase on the global covid-19 cases.
The Black Lives Matter protests
The murder of George Floyd perpetuated by Police Derek Chauvin and other 3 Minneapolis police on May 25, 2020 has ignited another form of social unrest - the Black Lives Matter protests. The BLM protests have spread different states and countries demanding justice for the death of George Floyd, equality among different races and opposition against racisms. Along with the protests comes with anarchy and riots. Radical protesters began looting, desecrating establishments and burning down buildings. After the BLM protests started in United States, Amsterdam also carried the BLM protests on June 1, 2020 and until the BLM protests has become worldwide. Though the BLM protests maybe more significant as compared to the anti-lockdown protests, it was still a social unrest and a form of uprising that can lead to chaos and troubles, and chances of the transmission of the coronavirus are still great because it is a form of congregation.
10. Racisms and the rise of the white supremacists
Xenophobia
The coronavirus pandemic had brought the worst among men. Ever since the covid-19 emerged from Wuhan, xenophobia against the Chinese has become more prevalent. Chinese nationals that has been residing in countries outside China were often targeted, marginalized and were thought to be carrier of the virus. Chinese were not spared from being targeted in other asian countries. In Hong Kong, during the height of the pandemic in Wuhan, Mandarin speaking Chinese were not welcome in many restaurants. In the Philippines, Filipino-Chinese ( around 40 % of population ) were avoided in many places though Filipinos were aware that they were not from the mainland China. In Australia, there was this news that 2 chinese ladies were attacked by Australian locals.
The coronavirus pandemic had brought xenophobia which is far more grim than the pandemic. In Europe and the United States, several chinese restaurants were attacked and vandalized. Other asians were also targeted in Europe and the United States and were blamed for spreading the disease in the country. They were often told to go back to the Philippines, China, India Singapore, Korea and other countries in Asia. This is really absurd, that in the toughest, many have preferred to put their displacements amid the pandemic to people who just happened to have different color. We are all humans after all.
The rise of the racists and white supremacists
This is indeed the worst and the most terrible plague of all. Racism in the United States has become more usual and prevailing since Trump came into power. The Neo nazis rejoiced and hailed Trump when he got elected in 2016, and they began blatantly harassing black Americans and Asians. The white supremacists began emerging from their filthy dens and these are the white uneducated deluded people who have this beliefs that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. There were crimes committed before that is racially motivated. We can all remember, Patrick Crusius, a white American psychopath and a white supremacist who shot 22 Hispanics at Walmart in El Paso texas on August 3, 2019. The mass shooting at El Paso Texas highlights the continuing racially motivated violence in the United States. In fact the United States has the highest incidents of racially motivated crime. There are many questions among non-whites after the incidence of mass shooting in El Paso Texas, is it still safe to live in the United States. There are other forms of racially motivated hatred by the white culprits, we have the Karens who are the middle-aged white women who are on the verge of their hormonal imbalances targeting black Americans and Asians, we also have the Proud boys and Trump supporters who think that having a white skin is a great privilege than having a working brain. The United States that was once a truly land of the free has become a frontier of evil racists and delusional white racists since Donald Trump elected as president. DONALD TRUMP DIDN'T MAKE UNITES STATES RACIST, HE MADE THE RACIST COMFORTABLE ENOUGH TO SHOW THEIR FACES IN THE PUBLIC.
