For my final data visualization project, I chose to work with a data set about the number of storms per country during different years. This data was from The Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT) , and Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED).
I decided to work with this dataset because I wanted to bring more awareness to natural disasters and how a single storm can truly impact an entire community and more. I also wanted to choose a data set on climate change and show a representation of just a fraction of the consequences we are facing because of climate change.
In my visualization, the data is represented by a purple circle, for each country that had a storm that year a purple circle will appear based on the longitude and latitude of the country, and increase in size for however many storms occurred that year. If you hover over each point it will state the name of the country and the number of storms. At the top of the screen is a slider that can be used to navigate between the years 1980 to 2022.
One interesting thing I noticed during this project is how by simply scrolling between years, you can quickly see the drastic change in pattern when it comes to the amount of storms. The difference between 1980 and 2000 is a perfect example of the increase in storms.
Something I wonder about while completing this project is how hard these storms impact the area they occur in. With the increase in storms each year, I wonder how difficult it becomes to rebound from these natural disasters, and how they will become a major issue in the future.
The most challenging moment of this project was how I wanted the user to switch between years the easiest without becoming confusing or causing any problems. I had originally buttons that could control if the user wanted to go up or down a year, although the buttons started to become in the way and took forever to go just a few years. So I finally decided on a slider because it was out of the way and easy to maneuver between years quickly.
If I had more time, I would like to add more information about where each storm took place and the backlash of the storm. Right now my project gives an idea about each storm, but I want the user to be able to learn and use my code as a source of information about the storms.
My proudest moment during this project was when I finished coding everything I wanted to and I was able to just admire all of the hard work and dedication I put into this project. Finishing the project was so rewarding because I was able to see my creativity and problem-solving pay off to create something I am very proud of.