GCSE Geography | Primary and Secondary Impacts of Weather Hazards (Weather Hazards 8)

When weather hazards occur they results in numerous primary and secondary impacts - often students (and teachers) find it tricky to distinguish between the two, but it is important to be able to do so as they often come up in 9 mark exam questions.

Primary impacts

Primary impacts are the direct impacts of the natural hazard, eg. effects of strong wind, heavy rain or storm surges and they happen during or immediately after the event.

In tropical storms you have damage to and destruction of buildings, however you also have loss of life through drowning, which causes 90% of deaths in tropical storms. Powerlines are often blown down and crops can be washed away. Tropical storms often bring huge storm surges with them.

Secondary impacts

Secondary impacts are the indirect effects causes by the primary impacts, after the main event - in the coming hours, days and weeks.

Tropical storms can lead to thousands of people losing their homes and becoming homeless, needing to be put up in temporary accommodation. A loss of crops or fishing boats could result in a loss of income and would hit food supplies. Shops could be shut due to the loss of power, schools might have to close disrupting education, etc.