A ghost town is a city that has been abandoned by its citizen, after a natural disaster, or the failure of the main economic activity. Other factors can explain the giving up of a city, the lack of natural resources (when freshwater has ran out), or the modification of the plan roads, which isolates the town.

Industrial disasters may lead to the abandonment of a city as well. It was the case in the city of Pripiat in Ukraine, when the 50 000 inhabitants had to evacuate the city after the blowup of a reactor in the nuclear power plant of Tchernobyl in April, 26th 1986. War may also lead to a ghost town, by destroying all the buildings or killing all the inhabitants.

Ghost cities are also found in former mining areas such as the island of Spitsbergen. In Norway. Cities were abandoned after the stop of the mine exploitation.

There are many ghost towns in the USA. They appeared because of various factors, sometimes because of the stop of a mining activity, sometimes it was due to a deviation of a railroad track, or because of a decrease of the seasonal migration of livestock managed by cowboys. Today, some of these ghost tows are used as attraction for tourists.

There are ghost towns all around the world and not only in the USA, they can be found in Europe, in Africa, In Asia, in Australia, and even in Antarctic.