A Wexelblat disaster is a disaster caused by the interaction of natural phenomena with human technology. A natural event damages some technological device or installation, and its failure precipitates much greater harm than the initial event. For instance, a storm may cause an oil tanker to sink, causing oil to spill out, causing massive damage to marine and coastal ecosystems.

Wexelblat disasters are named after Alan Wexelblat, a scientist employed by the MIT Media Lab. The original coinage, offered by Wexelblat himself, was "Viridian Disaster", in reference to the Viridian Design Movement led by Bruce Sterling, a science fiction writer, futurist, and activist who has focused his non-fiction writings since the mid-1990s (as well as at least one novel) on the greenhouse effect. Sterling for a while used structures such as "Wexelblat-style Viridian Disaster", but eventually shifted to "Wexelblat Disaster", and that coinage subsequently entered broader use. Wexelblat himself is reported to be somewhat chagrined by this turn of events. The building interior near the entrance The MIT Media Lab in the School of Architecture and Planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology engages in education and research in the digital technology used for expression and communication. ... The Viridian design movement is a Green movement tying together ecological design aspects with some love for high-tech gadgets, and some global awareness. ... Michael Bruce Sterling (born April 14, 1954) is an American science fiction author, best known for his novels and his seminal work on the Mirrorshades anthology, which defined the cyberpunk genre. ... A schematic representation of the exchanges of energy between outer space, the Earths atmosphere, and the Earth surface. ...