The Evaluation of Fire Rescue Capability from Post-Earthquake Fires in Taipei, Taiwan

Abstract

This paper assesses the Taipei's fire rescue capability against post-earthquake fires (PEFs) from a hypothetical earthquake. Taiwan's Shanchiao Fault was used as the trigger fault for establishing earthquake modeling assumptions. Monte Carlo simulation was used with hypocenter coordinates, the Richter magnitude scale, and earthquake focal depths as the uncertainty analysis variables for performing stochastic simulations of 100 sets of seismic event parameters. These parameters were entered into the Simple Earthquake Seismic System (SESS) and the Taiwan Earthquake Loss Estimation System (TELES) to conduct uncertainty analysis regarding PEFs. PEFs were simulated and the disaster readiness of all firefighting squads (strongholds) in Taipei was investigated to analyze the uncertainty in PEF rescues. The SESS analysis results indicate that the original risk probability was 25.26%, increasing to 45.88% with the activation of a regional mutual aid system. The original risk calculated by the TELES was 52.97%, which increased to 96.22% of the overall disaster response capacity requirements after the regional mutual aid system was launched. Although the SESS results remained below the 60% risk threshold following the launch of the regional mutual aid system, the rescue capacity was substantially increased. The TELES analysis results indicate that the regional mutual aid system can substantially increase local disaster rescue capacity, nearly satisfying all disaster resource scheduling requirements. The location, scale, and pattern of earthquakes and the resulting casualties are always uncertain. However, the results of this study verify that the 2 independently developed earthquake damage estimation systems can provide an effective reference for post-earthquake rescue scheduling assessments.