The word 旱灾 is formed by combining the character 旱, meaning "drought", which pictographically represents the sun (日) over dryness (干), with the character 灾, meaning "disaster", originally depicting a fire (火) under a roof (宀) to convey calamity. Together, they create a compound where 旱 specifies the cause as drought and 灾 categorizes it as a disaster, resulting in the term for "drought disaster".