1960 disasters

The Great Chinese Famine (Chinese: 三年大饥荒; 'three years of great famine') was a famine that occurred between 1959 and 1961 in the People's Republic of China (PRC). Some scholars have also included the years 1958 or 1962. It is widely regarded as the deadliest famine and one of the greatest man-made disasters in human history, with an estimated death toll due to starvation that ranges in the tens of millions (15 to 55 million). The most stricken provinces were Anhui (18% dead), Chongqing (15%), Sichuan (13%), Guizhou (11%) and Hunan (8%).

The Nedelin catastrophe or Nedelin disaster, known in Russia as the Catastrophe at Baikonur Cosmodrome (Russian: Катастрофа на Байконуре, Katastrofa na Baikonure), was a launch pad accident that occurred on 24 October 1960 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Soviet Kazakhstan. As a prototype of the R-16 intercontinental ballistic missile was being prepared for a test flight, an explosion occurred when the second stage engine ignited accidentally, killing an unknown number of military and technical personnel working on the preparations. Despite the magnitude of the disaster, information was suppressed for many years and the Soviet government did not acknowledge the event until 1989. With more than 54 recognized casualties, it is the deadliest disaster in space exploration history. The catastrophe is named for the Chief Marshal of Artillery Mitrofan Ivanovich Nedelin, who was the head of the R-16 development program and perished in the explosion.