List of disasters in Canada by death toll

This list of Canadian disasters by death toll includes major disasters (excluding acts of war) that occurred on Canadian soil or involved Canadian citizens, in a definable incident, where the loss of life was 10 or more.

200 or more deaths

Disaster	Type	Location	Deaths	Date	Notes
COVID-19	Pandemic	Canada	50,000+	2020–present	Ongoing
HIV/AIDS	Pandemic	Canada	26,000+	1981–present	Ongoing
Canadian typhus	Epidemic	Canada	20,000+	1847–1848
Asian flu	Pandemic	Canada	7,000	1957–1958
Russian flu	Pandemic	Canada	6,000	1890–1891
Newfoundland Hurricane of 1775	Hurricane	Newfoundland	4,000	1775
Hong Kong flu	Pandemic	Canada	4,000	1968
1700 Cascadia earthquake	Earthquake	British Columbia	Unknown, likely several thousand	January 26, 1700	True figures unknown. Many coastal First Nations villages (such as Kiix-in) were completely wiped out.
Tseax Cone eruption	Volcano	British Columbia	2,000	~1700
Halifax Explosion	Explosion	Nova Scotia	2,000	1917	estimate; 1,950 recorded names
RMS Empress of Ireland	Shipwreck	Quebec	1,012	1914	St. Lawrence River
2021 Western North America heat wave	Heat wave	British Columbia and Alberta	676	2021	610 excess deaths in BC and 66 excess deaths in Alberta during the week
Polio	Epidemic	Canada	500+	1953
RMS Atlantic	Shipwreck	Nova Scotia	562	1873	Marrs Head, Mosher Island, Meagher's Island
Swine flu	Pandemic	Canada	428	2009 to 2010	out of 3 million Canadians infected
Duke William	Shipwreck	North Atlantic, near English coast	360	December 13, 1758	during the expulsion of the Acadians
SS Princess Sophia	Shipwreck	Near Juneau, Alaska	353	1918	en route from Vancouver and Victoria to northern BC and Alaska
Aeneas	Shipwreck	Newfoundland	340	1805	Isle aux Morts
Violet	Shipwreck	England	300	December 13, 1758	during the expulsion of the Acadians, near English coast, bound for France
Sybelle	Shipwreck	St. Paul Island, Nova Scotia	316	September 11, 1834	emigrant ship wreck
Great Labrador Gale of 1885	Hurricane	Coast of Labrador, Newfoundland	300	October 10, 1885
SS Pacific	Shipwreck	British Columbia	298	1875	near Cape Flattery out of Victoria, BC
Air India Flight 182	Terrorism	Atlantic Ocean	268 (Canadians)	1985	flight out of Montréal Mirabel International Airport, bomb exploded off the coast of Ireland. 268 out of 329 total fatalities were Canadian.
Arrow Air Flight 1285	Aircrash	Gander, NL	256	1985	As of 2022, it is the deadliest aviation accident to occur on Canadian soil.
SS Montreal	Shipwreck	Quebec	253	June 26, 1857	burned near Québec.
Great Lakes Storm of 1913	Storm	Great Lakes Basin, ON	250	1913	estimate for Canada and U.S. fatalities
HMS Tribune	Shipwreck	Halifax, NS	238	1797	Wrecked at Halifax
SS Anglo Saxon	Shipwreck	Cape Race, Avalon Peninsula, Newfoundland	237	1863	Allan Line shipwreck
Swissair Flight 111	Aircrash	Nova Scotia	229	1998	St. Margarets Bay, Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia hurricane of 1873	Hurricane	Nova Scotia	223 (disputed)	1873	The Monthly Weather Review, published by the American Meteorological Society, set the death toll at 223 but the New York Times set the toll at 600
Matheson Fire	Fire	Ontario	223	1916	Official estimate
SS Hungarian	Shipwreck	Cape Sable, NS	205	1860	Allan Line passenger ship wrecked Cape Sable, NS
USS Pollux (AKS-2) and USS Truxtun (DD-229)	Shipwreck	Placentia Bay, Newfoundland	203	1942	Wreck of the USS Pollux resulted in 93 fatalities and USS Truxtun 110; the USS Wilkes (DD-441) also grounded, but there were no fatalities.

100 to 199 deaths

Disaster	Type	Location	Deaths	Date	Notes
Ruby	Shipwreck	near the Azores	190+	December 16, 1758	during the expulsion of the Acadians
Hillcrest mine disaster	Explosion	Hillcrest, AB	189	June 19, 1914
Victoria steamboat disaster	Shipwreck	London, ON	182+	May 24, 1881
SS Southern Cross	Shipwreck	Newfoundland	174	March 31, 1914
SS Florizel	Shipwreck	Cappahayden, NL	173	February 23, 1918
1927 Nova Scotia hurricane	Hurricane	NS	173-192	August 23–25, 1927	approximate figure, most deaths occurred at sea
Miramichi fire	Forest fire	NB	160	October 1825
1887 Nanaimo mine explosion	Explosion	Nanaimo, BC	150	May 3, 1887
SS Valencia	Shipwreck	Vancouver Island, BC	136	January 22, 1906
Franklin's lost expedition	Mass disappearance	Northwest Passage	129	1845–1848	The final expedition of John Franklin, where the HMS Erebus (1826) and HMS Terror (1813) were lost in the Northwest Passage
Coal Creek mine disaster	Explosion	Coal Creek, BC	128	May 22, 1902
First Springhill mining disaster	Explosion	Springhill, NS	125	February 21, 1891
SS Noronic fire	Shipwreck	Toronto, ON	118	September 17, 1949
Trans-Canada Air Lines Flight 831	Plane crash	Sainte-Thérèse, QC	118	November 29, 1963
HMS Acorn	Shipwreck	Halifax, NS	115	April 14, 1828
Air Canada Flight 621	Plane crash	Brampton, ON	109	July 5, 1970
HMS Feversham	Shipwreck	Scatarie Island, Main-à-Dieu, NS	102	October 7, 1711

10 to 99 deaths

The list below does not include aeronautical disasters in Saskatchewan or deaths during the 1885 North-West Rebellion to First Nations peoples, settlers, or military personnel

• 99 – St-Hilaire train disaster, Richelieu River, Beloeil, Quebec, June 29, 1864 [deadliest train disaster in Canada]
• 99 – Knights of Columbus Hostel fire, St John's, Newfoundland, December 12, 1942
• 84 – Ocean Ranger oil platform sinking, Grand Banks, February 15, 1982
• 81 [Canadian fatalities only] – Hurricane Hazel, Toronto, October 1954
• 78 – SS Newfoundland seal hunt disaster, Newfoundland, March 1914
• 77 – Laurier Palace Theatre fire, Montreal, January 9, 1927
• 76 – Quebec Bridge first collapse, August 29, 1907
• 74 – Third Springhill mining disaster, Springhill, Nova Scotia, October 23, 1958
• 74 – The 2018 North American heat wave resulted in 74 deaths in Quebec
• 73–200 – Great Porcupine Fire, Porcupine, Ontario, July 10, 1911
• 70 – Desjardins Canal disaster, railway bridge collapse, March 12, 1857
• 70 – Frank Slide, Turtle Mountain (Alberta), April 29, 1903
• 64 – Canadian Pacific Airlines Flight 402 (CP402) McDonnell Douglas DC-8-43 crashed on landing, Tokyo, Japan March 4, 1966
• 63 [Canadian fatalities only] – Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752, January 8, 2020 [fatalities may exclude some holders of Iranian passports ]
• 62 – Rogers Pass avalanche, Rogers Pass, British Columbia, March 4, 1910
• 62 – Trans-Canada Air Lines Flight 810, Chilliwack, British Columbia, December 9, 1956
• 59 – Despatch shipwreck, Isle aux Morts, Newfoundland, July 12, 1828
• 55 – Point Ellice Bridge disaster, Victoria, British Columbia, May 26, 1896
• 55-58 – 1926 Nova Scotia hurricane, August 8, 1926 [approximate figure, most deaths occurred at sea]
• 54 – 2018 Eastern Canada heat wave
• 52 – Great Western Railway passenger train collides with the tail end of gravel train at Baptiste Creek, Canada West. October 27, 1854
• 52-232 – 1900 Galveston hurricane, September 12–14, 1900 [approximate figure, most deaths occurred at sea]
• 52 – Canadian Pacific Airlines Flight 21 Douglas DC-6B crashed near Dog Creek, British Columbia when a bomb blew its tail section away, July 8, 1965
• 48 – Opémiska Community Hall fire, Chapais, Quebec, December 31, 1979
• 47 – Lac-Mégantic rail disaster, Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, July 6, 2013
• 44 – Spanish River derailment, Northern Ontario, January 21, 1910
• 44 – US Military DC-4 crash, 42 US military personnel and 2 civilians, presumably somewhere in Yukon or British Columbia, January 26, 1950
• 44 – 1997 Les Éboulements bus accident, Quebec, October 13, 1997
• 43 – Great Fire of 1922, Timiskaming District, Ontario, October 4–5, 1922
• 43 – SARS outbreak, Toronto, Ontario, February–September 2003 (out of 251 total cases)
• 42 – Pacific Western Airlines Flight 314, Cranbrook/Canadian Rockies International Airport, February 11, 1978
• 40+ – HMS Penelope, April 30, 1815, near Cap des Rosiers (many survivors later froze to death)
• 40 – Quebec rockslide, Cap Diamant, September 19, 1889
• 40 – SS Islander (Canadian Pacific Steam Navigation Company), sunk by iceberg, Lynn Canal south of Juneau, Alaska, August 15, 1901
• 40 [Canadian fatalities only] – Titanic, sank April 15, 1912 (Canadian deaths only of 1,517 total)
• 40 – Eastman bus accident, Eastman, Quebec, August 4, 1978
• 39 – Hollinger Mining Disaster, Timmins, Ontario, February 10, 1928
• 39 – Almonte train wreck, December 27, 1942
• 39 – Second Springhill mining disaster, Springhill, Nova Scotia, November 1, 1956
• 37 – Great Labrador Gale of 1867, October 9, 1867
• 37+ – 1869 Saxby Gale, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, October 4–5, 1869 [most deaths occurred at sea]
• 37 – Canadian Pacific Airlines Douglas C-54 A-10-DC disappeared en route without trace out of Vancouver, British Columbia for Anchorage, Alaska, July 21, 1951
• 37 – Blue Bird Café fire, Montreal, September 1, 1972
• 35 – 1959 Escuminac hurricane, Gulf of St. Lawrence, June 19, 1959
• 32 – L'Isle-Verte nursing home fire, L'Isle-Verte, Quebec, January 23, 2014
• 31 – Halifax Poor House Fire, November 7, 1882
• 31 – Dugald train disaster, Dugald, Manitoba, September 1, 1947
• 31 – Saint-Jean-Vianney, Quebec mudslide, May 4, 1971
• 30 – John B. King explosion, near Brockville, Ontario, June 26, 1930, lightning struck a drill boat containing dynamite
• 30 [est.] – Quebec blizzard, March 3–5, 1971 (conservative estimate, all in Quebec)
• 29 – 1929 Grand Banks earthquake and tsunami, Burin Peninsula, November 18, 1929
• 29 – SS Edmund Fitzgerald, Lake Superior November 10, 1975, went down with all hands
• 28 – Regina Cyclone, Regina, Saskatchewan, June 30, 1912
• 28 – LaSalle Heights Disaster, LaSalle, Quebec, March 1, 1965
• 28 [Canadian fatalities only] – North American ice storm of 1998, January 1998
• 27 – SS Viking, explosion, Horse Islands, Newfoundland and Labrador, March 15, 1931
• 27 – Ironworkers Memorial Second Narrows Crossing bridge collapse, Vancouver, June 17, 1958
• 27 – Canadian Pacific Air Lines Flight 301 Bristol Britannia crashed in Honolulu, Hawaii, July 22, 1962
• 27 – Edmonton tornado, Edmonton, Alberta, July 31, 1987
• 26+ – HMS Speedy shipwreck in snowstorm, Lake Ontario, October 8, 1804
• 26-28 – Granduc Mine avalanche, Stewart, British Columbia, February 18, 1965 (some references say 28 were killed)
• 26 – Westray Mine methane explosion, Plymouth, Nova Scotia, May 9, 1992
• 24 – Air Ontario Flight 1363, near Dryden, Ontario, March 10, 1989
• 24 – 9/11, September 11, 2001 [Canada fatalities only]
• 23 – Québec Airways DC-3 bomb sabotage, Saint-Joachim, Quebec, September 9, 1949 See Albert Guay
• 23 – Air Canada Flight 797, aircraft fire, Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, June 2, 1983
• 23 – Hinton train collision, Hinton, Alberta, February 8, 1986
• 23 – Legionnaire's disease outbreak, Toronto, 2005
• 23 – 2020 Nova Scotia attacks, Nova Scotia, April 18–19, 2020
• 22 – Bus crash Swift Current, Saskatchewan, May 28, 1980
• 22 – 2008 Canada listeriosis outbreak, 2008 (out of 57 total cases)
• 21 – Canoe River train crash, Valemount, British Columbia, November 21, 1950
• 21 – MV Flare bulk carrier shipwreck, Cabot Strait, January 16, 1998
• 20 – Beauval Indian Residential School fire, Beauval, Saskatchewan, September 20, 1927
• 19 – Dorion level crossing accident, Dorion, Quebec, October 7, 1966
• 18 – Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302, March 10, 2019 [Canadian victims only]
• 17 – School bus train collision, Lamont, Alberta, November 29, 1960
• 17 – Windsor–Tecumseh tornado, Windsor, Ontario June 17, 1946
• 17 – Cougar Helicopters Flight 91, off Newfoundland, March 12, 2009
• 16 – Protection Island mining disaster, September 10, 1918: elevator cable break
• 16 – Humboldt Broncos bus crash, April 6, 2018
• 15 – Ottawa & New York Railway Bridge (south channel crossing) bridge collapse, Cornwall, Ontario, September 6, 1898
• 15 – Orleans air disaster, Orleans, Ontario, May 15, 1956
• 15 – Canadian Pacific Airlines Flight 307 Douglas DC-6B aircrash, near Cold Bay, Alaska, August 29, 1956
• 15 – 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami [Canadian victims only]
• 15 – Les Éboulements bus accident, Quebec, June 1, 1974
• 14 – "Barrie" tornado outbreak, May 31, 1985
• 14 – École Polytechnique massacre, shooting rampage, December 6, 1989
• 13 – Sand Point, Ontario, head-on train collision, February 9, 1904
• 13 – Quebec Bridge second collapse, September 11, 1913
• 13 – MS Arctic Explorer shipwreck, off St Anthony, Newfoundland, July 3, 1981
• 12 - Boating tragedy Lake of Two Mountains, L'Île-Bizard, Quebec. Twelve NCC (Negro Community Centre) children drown, July 13 1954.
• 12 – M.F.V. Enterprise and MV Patrick Morris sinking (the latter was responding to a mayday call from the former), northeast of Cape Breton Island, April 20, 1970
• 12 – Cormier-Village Hayride Accident, Cormier-Village, New Brunswick, Oct 1989
• 12 – Pine Lake tornado in Alberta, July 14, 2000
• 12 – First Air Flight 6560 a Boeing 737 crashes near Resolute Bay, Nunavut, August 20, 2011
• 11 – Canadian Pacific Airlines De Havilland DH-106 Comet 1A CF-CUN "Empress of Hawaii", crashed on takeoff from Karachi, Pakistan, March 3, 1953 (first passenger jetliner involved in a fatal accident)
• 11 – Collision between a van and an eighteen-wheeler, between Stratford and Perth, Ontario, February 6, 2012. (ten of the killed were Peruvian migrant workers)
• 10 – Metropolitan Store explosion, Windsor, Ontario, October 25, 1960
• 10 – Rupert Hotel Fire, Toronto, December 23, 1989
• 10 – Toronto van attack, Toronto, April 23, 2018
• 10 – 2022 Saskatchewan stabbings, Saskatchewan, September 4, 2022

See also

• Index of Canada-related articles
• List of disasters in Antarctica by death toll
• List of disasters in Australia by death toll
• List of disasters in Canada (by date)
• List of disasters in Croatia by death toll
• List of disasters in Great Britain and Ireland by death toll
• List of disasters in New Zealand by death toll
• List of disasters in Poland by death toll
• List of disasters in the United States by death toll
• List of anthropogenic disasters by death toll (worldwide)
• Volcanism of Canada

External links

• Canadian Disasters: an historical survey by Robert L. Jones
• SOS! Canadian Disasters, a virtual museum exhibition at Library and Archives Canada
• Maritime Museum of the Atlantic: Marine Heritage Database