They were able to manage the natural disaster because institutions existed for such purpose. They have professional Police Force and emergency paramedics whose job is to protect the citizens and provide services when the need arise. Should such calamity occur in Nigeria, only God knows what the outcome would look like. One of the things we know for sure is that hundreds would perish before information filters out to the government. Telephone is one of the fastest mediums to communicate with outside world.
Telephone is a rare commodity in Nigeria and very expensive to acquire.
Since the remote government that controls everything can not be reached on time thus more people with high probability to survive would kick the bucket. The point is that reviews of Nigerian government response to past emergencies show a lack of planning for such incidents. In Odi and Kaduna for example, it took the government a couple of days before taking actions. In fact, the role of the government in Nigeria is ill defined. Those at the epic of the government saw their job as presiding over revenue allocation and other mini functions.