Does the Pacific or the Atlantic create more fearsome storms?

[beer]

I know the eastern Pacific is cold and therefore doesn't generate big storms. But what about the stuff in the western end of the Pacific? How do the storms that smack into India and Indonesia compare to something like Rita?

 

[venk]

The Tsunami was much worse than the Hurricanes mainly due to the lack of warning.

 

[HardcoreRobot]

tsunamis arent storms

 

[FoBoT]

google "Fujiwhara effect "

http://www.cnmi-guide.com/info/essays/miscellaneous/1.html

a long read, but some really good stuff on typhoons

When two typhoons develop in proximity of each other the possibility
of a Fujiwhara effect bears close monitoring. During such an event a
binary interaction is possible where tropical cyclones within 750 nautical
miles of each other begin to rotate about one another. When the two are
within 400 nautical miles of each other they may also begin to be drawn
together.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fujiwhara_interaction

A few sets of examples can be found in the busy 1995 Atlantic hurricane season. During the height of the season, Hurricane Humberto and Hurricane Iris took part in a brief Fujiwhara interaction. Iris then began interacting with a third storm, Tropical Storm Karen, which orbited and later merged with the more intense Iris. That same year in the Pacific, Typhoon Pat and Typhoon Ruth completed a full orbit around their centroid before collapsing into a single cyclone.

 

[beer]

Originally posted by: venk
The Tsunami was much worse than the Hurricanes mainly due to the lack of warning.

caused by an earthquake, not a storm....

 

[Whitecloak]

India is nowhere near the Pacific Ocean.

 

[FoBoT]

http://www.geocities.com/dtmcbride/hist/disasters-war.html#natural

#5 is a cyclone/flood with a death toll of 300,000 to 500,000

#13 is a cyclone/flood with 138,000

total Deaths 1900-2004 worldwide for all "windstorms" is listed at 1.2 Million


if you look at the list, in general normal "floods" are the worst followed by earthquakes, generally speaking