🏛️ Disasters Trivia Questions & Answers
Below are 30 free disasters trivia questions with answers — part of History trivia on BUZZ. Want a real challenge that adapts to what you know? Play the History quiz — no signup needed to start.
30 Disasters trivia questions
Q1. Which volcano's 79 AD eruption buried the Roman city of Pompeii?
Answer: Mount Vesuvius
💡 Plaster casts of victims, poured into hollows left in the hardened ash, still capture their final poses.
Q2. In which US city did the Great Fire of October 1871 destroy 17,000 buildings?
Answer: Chicago
💡 The blaze started in a barn on DeKoven Street, but the 'cow kicked a lantern' story was invented decades later by a reporter.
Q3. The 1883 eruption of which volcano produced the loudest sound ever recorded?
Answer: Krakatoa
💡 The blast was heard nearly 3,000 miles away on Rodrigues Island in the Indian Ocean.
Q4. The Titanic sank in which year?
Answer: 1912
💡 The Titanic sank after striking an iceberg at 11:40 PM on 14 April 1912.
Q5. What was the name of the ship that sank in 1912?
Answer: RMS Titanic
💡 The Titanic sank on 15 April 1912 after hitting an iceberg in the North Atlantic.
Q6. Which Soviet power plant's 1986 reactor explosion forced the permanent evacuation of a nearby city?
Answer: Chernobyl
💡 Chernobyl and the 2011 Fukushima accident are the only two disasters rated at the maximum level on the international nuclear event scale.
Q7. Which hydrogen airship burst into flames docking in New Jersey in 1937, ending the airship era?
Answer: The Hindenburg
💡 The disaster was captured on newsreel film and radio, and the footage shocked audiences worldwide.
Q8. What disaster struck London in September 1666?
Answer: The Great Fire of London
💡 The Great Fire of London burned for four days, destroying 13,200 houses and 87 churches including St Paul's Cathedral. Remarkably, only 6 deaths were officially recorded — though the true number was likely higher.
Q9. Henry VIII's warship Mary Rose sank in 1545 in which stretch of water?
Answer: The Solent
💡 Raised in 1982 before 60 million TV viewers, she yielded more than 19,000 Tudor-era artefacts.
Q10. A 1919 Boston disaster saw a huge storage tank burst, unleashing a wave of what?
Answer: Molasses
💡 The sticky wave reportedly moved at 35 miles per hour, sweeping through Boston's North End.
Q11. The catastrophic 1889 Johnstown Flood was caused by the failure of what?
Answer: The South Fork Dam
💡 The collapse sent a wall of water crashing into the Pennsylvania town 14 miles downstream.
Q12. What French cargo ship's collision caused the giant 1917 Halifax Harbour blast?
Answer: SS Mont-Blanc
💡 The blast was the largest man-made explosion before the atomic bomb, flattening much of Halifax.
Q13. In 1956, the liner Andrea Doria sank after colliding with which ship near Nantucket?
Answer: MS Stockholm
💡 Nearly all 1,660 people aboard the Andrea Doria were rescued before she sank the next morning.
Q14. Which medieval epidemic killed roughly one-third of Europe's population in the 14th century?
Answer: Black Death
💡 The Black Death (bubonic plague) reached Europe in 1347 and killed an estimated 30-60% of Europe's population. It permanently altered medieval society, labour markets, and the Church's authority.
Q15. Which European capital was devastated by a massive earthquake on 1 November 1755?
Answer: Lisbon
💡 The quake struck on All Saints' Day, toppling churches packed with worshippers and sparking a firestorm.
Q16. What liquid, bursting from a brewery vat, flooded a London street in 1814?
Answer: Beer
💡 Over 128,000 gallons surged from Meux's brewery, demolishing a back wall and nearby homes.
Q17. Which nicknamed US bridge twisted apart and collapsed in high winds in 1940?
Answer: Tacoma Narrows Bridge
💡 Its rhythmic swaying, nicknamed 'Galloping Gertie,' was caught on film still shown to engineering students.
Q18. In 1944, fire tore through the big top of which traveling circus in Hartford?
Answer: Ringling Bros. Circus
💡 Waterproofing on the tent canvas had been mixed with gasoline, letting flames spread with terrifying speed.
Q19. A 1947 ship fire and explosion leveled Texas City — what was its cargo?
Answer: Ammonium nitrate
💡 It remains the deadliest industrial accident in US history, destroying much of the port town.
Q20. Mount Pelée's 1902 eruption obliterated which Caribbean city in minutes?
Answer: Saint-Pierre
💡 The blast killed nearly all of the city's 30,000 residents, leaving only a handful of survivors.
Q21. In 1927, collapsing levees along which US river caused catastrophic flooding?
Answer: The Mississippi River
💡 Floodwaters submerged parts of several states for weeks, reshaping US flood-control policy for decades.
Q22. The Great Kanto earthquake of 1923 devastated Tokyo and which port city?
Answer: Yokohama
💡 The quake and the fires it triggered killed more than 140,000 people across the region.
Q23. Searching the 1908 Tunguska blast site, scientists were puzzled to find no what?
Answer: Crater
💡 The blast flattened roughly 80 million trees across 830 square miles of Siberian forest.
Q24. Fire engulfed the steamship General Slocum in 1904 on which New York river?
Answer: The East River
💡 It stood as New York's worst disaster by lives lost until the Titanic sank eight years later.
Q25. Overloaded with returning Union soldiers, which steamboat exploded in 1865?
Answer: The Sultana
💡 It remains the deadliest maritime disaster in US history, despite being far less well known than the Titanic.
Q26. Whose LA water department oversaw the fatal 1928 St. Francis Dam collapse?
Answer: William Mulholland
💡 The dam failed just before midnight, sending a wall of water toward the Pacific within hours.
Q27. A quake and tsunami killed some 120,000 in 1908 near which Italian strait?
Answer: The Strait of Messina
💡 It's still ranked the deadliest earthquake in Europe's recorded history.
Q28. In 1914, a foggy collision sank the liner Empress of Ireland on which river?
Answer: The St. Lawrence River
💡 Over 1,000 died in just 14 minutes, making it Canada's worst peacetime maritime disaster.
Q29. Iceland's 1783 Laki eruption caused famine across Europe mainly through what?
Answer: A toxic gas haze
💡 The eruption's sulfurous fog killed crops and livestock as far away as continental Europe.
Q30. A 1963 landslide sent a wave over which Italian dam, killing nearly 2,000?
Answer: The Vajont Dam
💡 Officials had ignored warnings that the reservoir's mountainside was dangerously unstable.
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