Effective Disaster Mitigation Research Articles

Vulnerability Factors and Effectiveness of Disaster Mitigation Measures in the Bangladesh Coast

The major objective of this paper is to identify the vulnerability factors and examine the effectiveness of disaster mitigation measures undertaken by individuals, government and non-government organisations to mitigate the impacts of cyclones in the Bangladesh coast experiencing from Cyclone Aila. The primary data were collected from two villages of southwestern coastal areas of Bangladesh using questionnaire survey and interviews of the key informants. The data were analysed using the descriptive and inferential statistics. This paper reveals that the disaster management measures have a significant role to lessen the impacts of the cyclonic event, especially in pre-disaster preparedness, cyclone warning message dissemination, evacuation and post-disaster rehabilitation. The households, who have access to shelter, find weather forecast regularly and adopted pre-disaster awareness measures are relatively less susceptible to hazard’s impacts. The disaster management measures undertaken by individuals and GOs and NGOs help coastal people to save their lives and property from the negative impacts of cyclones. The analysis shows that the NGOs’ role is more effective and efficient than the GOs in cyclone disaster management. This paper identifies distance to shelter, participation in disaster training, efficient warning, etc. as the influential factors of vulnerability cyclones. The analysis finds the households as less affected who have adopted disaster preparedness measures. However, this paper concludes that the effective and proper disaster management and mitigation measures are very crucial to shield the lives and properties of the Bangladeshi coastal people.

English

Analysis of spatial and temporal drought variability in the upper Tana River basin using Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) was conducted. The drought is critical for formulation of mitigation measures in the river basin. A monthly temporal and 90-m spatial resolution was applied. This was achieved within ArcGIS environment. Climatic data for 1970 to 2010 was used for computation of the PDSI while the missing data sets were filled using Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs). The results of PDSI for dry and wet seasons at meteorological stations indicate that the time series plots for the PDSI values for dry season are generally lower than those for the wet seasons. The PDSI values for meteorological stations located at the lower elevation of the basin are lower than those located at higher elevation. On the other hand, spatially distributed drought severity based on PDSI show that the ranges of maximum and minimum drought severity values in 1970 are -0.868 to -0.804 and -0.675 to -0.610 respectively. These values of drought severity occur respectively in the north-western and south-eastern areas of the basin. PDSI values increased from the range -0.675 to -0.610 in 1970 and from -1.087 to 0.957 in 2010 for the north-eastern areas of the upper basin. The south eastern areas of the basin are more prone to drought risks than north-western parts. Use of the PDSI reflects the spatial heterogeneity and temporal variability of drought across the basin. The drought assessment offer technical approach for comprehensive understanding of drought for effective drought-induced disaster mitigation and its management, with a view to reducing adverse effects on livelihoods. Key words: Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI), drought severity, upper Tana River basin, monthly resolution, drought-induced disaster.

Evaluation of TRMM Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis during the passage of Tropical Cyclones over Fiji

Fiji is prone to the devastating effects of heavy rainfall during the passage of tropical cyclones (TCs) and as such accurate measurement of rainfall during such events is urgent for effective disaster mitigation and risk analysis. Fiji, however, has a sparse distribution of rain gauges, thus there is a deficiency in the accurate measurement of rainfall. This gap could be filled by satellite-based rainfall estimates but before they are used, they need to be validated against a reference dataset for their accuracy and limitations. This study thus validates the TRMM based Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA) estimates over the island of Fiji. The study shows that TMPA has moderate skill in estimating rainfall during the passage of TCs over the island of Fiji. This skill is also highly variable as it decreases with an increase in rainfall intensity, increase in distance from the cyclone centre and increasing terrain elevation. The ability of TMPA also varies case by case but we report a general underestimation of rainfall by TMPA during the passage of TCs with a larger rainfall rate (defined in our case as those TCs with average daily rainfall greater than 25 mm day-1).

Special Issue on the International Symposium on River Technologies for Innovations and Social Systems at the WECC2015 and the Special Session on Disaster Risk Management at the 11th I3R2

The Standing Technical Committees on Disaster Risk Management (CDRM) of the World Federation of Engineering Organizations (WFEO) play an important role in collecting and disseminating DRM-related information and knowledge that will conceivably help engineering society members take effective disaster mitigation measures. As part of achieving this mission, the CDRM conducted two important 2015 events – the WFEO-CDRM Special Session on Disaster Risk Management at the 11th International Conference of the International Institute for Infrastructure Resilience and Reconstruction (I3R2) (I3R2 session) held in Seoul, Korea, and the 9th Joint International Symposium on Disaster Risk Management conducted in conjunction with the International Symposium on River Technologies for Innovations and Social Systems held in the 2015 World Engineering Conference and Convention (WECC2015) in Kyoto, Japan (WECC2015 symposium). The I3R2 session featured seven presentations. During the first half, disaster-cause papers covered high typhoon tides, earthquakes, and rain-induced soil erosion. The second half focused on mitigation-measure presentations such as recovery/reconstruction and regional support for mothers and children in the event of disasters. The WECC2015 symposium featured ten presentations by ten speakers with widely varied backgrounds in disaster mitigation, river engineering, international cooperation, UNESCO regional centers, NPO management, science and technology sections at embassies, and ferry and resort complex management. These informative, meaningful presentations close with active and informative Q&A sessions. In this special issue, five presentations that were revised as a form of academic paper were selected and published. I hope that these papers will be utilized for further advancement of disaster mitigation measures.

Evaluation of TRMM Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis during the passage of Tropical Cyclones over Fiji

Fiji is prone to the devastating effects of heavy rainfall during the passage of tropical cyclones (TCs) and as such accurate measurement of rainfall during such events is urgent for effective disaster mitigation and risk analysis. Fiji, however, has a sparse distribution of rain gauges, thus there is a deficiency in the accurate measurement of rainfall. This gap could be filled by satellite-based rainfall estimates but before they are used, they need to be validated against a reference dataset for their accuracy and limitations. This study thus validates the TRMM based Multi-satellite Precipitation Analysis (TMPA) estimates over the island of Fiji. The study shows that TMPA has moderate skill in estimating rainfall during the passage of TCs over the island of Fiji. This skill is also highly variable as it decreases with an increase in rainfall intensity, increase in distance from the cyclone centre and increasing terrain elevation. The ability of TMPA also varies case by case but we report a general underestimation of rainfall by TMPA during the passage of TCs with a larger rainfall rate (defined in our case as those TCs with average daily rainfall greater than 25 mm day-1).

Possible Future Climate Change Impacts on the Hydrological Drought Events in the Weihe River Basin, China

Quantitative evaluation of future climate change impacts on hydrological drought characteristics is one of important measures for implementing sustainable water resources management and effective disaster mitigation in drought-prone regions under the changing environment. In this study, a modeling system for projecting the potential future climate change impacts on hydrological droughts in the Weihe River basin (WRB) in North China is presented. This system consists of a large-scale hydrological model driven by climate outputs from three climate models (CMs) for future streamflow projections, a probabilistic model for univariate drought assessment, and a copula-based bivariate model for joint drought frequency analysis under historical and future climates. With the observed historical climate data as the inputs, the Variable Infiltration Capacity hydrological model projects an overall runoff reduction in the WRB under the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change A1B scenario. The univariate drought assessment found that although fewer hydrological drought events would occur under A1B scenario, drought duration and severity tend to increase remarkably. Moreover, the bivariate drought assessment reveals that future droughts in the same return period as the baseline droughts would become more serious. With these trends in the future, the hydrological drought situation in the WRB would be further deteriorated.

The role of hazard vulnerability assessments in disaster preparedness and prevention in China.

China is prone to disasters and escalating disaster losses. Effective disaster mitigation is the foundation for efficient disaster response and rescue and for reducing the degree of hazardous impacts on the population. Vulnerability refers to the population’s capacity to anticipate, cope with, and recover from the impact of a hazardous event. A hazard vulnerability assessment (HVA) systematically evaluates the damage that could be caused by a potential disaster, the severity of the impact, and the available medical resources during a disaster to reduce population vulnerability and increase the capacity to cope with disasters. In this article, we summarized HVA team membership, content (disaster identification, probability and consequences), and methods and procedures for an HVA that can be tailored to China’s needs. We further discussed the role of epidemiology in an HVA. Disaster epidemiology studies the underlying causes of disasters to achieve effective disaster prevention and reduction. In addition, we made several recommendations that are already in practice in developed countries, such as the U.S., for future implementation in China and other developing countries. An effective HVA plan is crucial for successful disaster preparedness, response, and recovery.

PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF CLASSIFIERS ON ACTIVITY RECOGNITION FOR DISASTERS MITIGATION USING SMARTPHONE SENSING

Activity recognition (ARs) is a classification problem that cuts across many domains. The introduction of ARs accuracy which may be significantly low with decision tree algorithm and the use of smartphone sensing in previous studies has proven its relevance for effective disaster mitigation in our society. Smartphone sensing is an approach found to be useful for activity recognition to monitor people in large gatherings due to the power of embedded sensors on the handheld devices. In this paper, a multitask activity recognition architecture is proposed for proper monitoring of people in large gatherings to control disaster occurrences in crowd, flood, road and fire accidents using related activity scenario in time of danger. We implement the proposed architecture to determine the outcome of activity recognized with K-nearest neighbour (KNN) for k= 3 and 4 to compare performance to that of weka using accelerometer and digital compass (dc) sensors on the same dataset. The results of ARs accuracy of 100% and 99% in weka, 85% and 89% with KNN shows an improved performance in both tools. The performance of Multilayer Perceptron (MLP), Support Vector Machine (SVM), Naives baye (NB), Decision tree (DT), against KNN were investigated using precision, recall and f-measure in weka as well. The results show significant improvement with performance parameters on accelerometer and dc against the use of accelerometer sensor only with KNN and DT having low number of classified activity recognized on training and testing data.

1. Introduction: Frameworks for disaster research

For the most part, research and evaluations of disasters have lacked a standardised approach necessary to form a scientific basis for the discipline of health disaster. There has been an abundance of epidemiological research and quasi-scientific reports. However, for the most part, these have been devoid of rigorous scientific methodology. As such, it has been difficult to translate lessons learned in previous disasters into effective disaster prevention, mitigation, and interventions with a better outcome. Interventional research consists of evaluations of responses (actions) during and following disasters or evaluations of preparedness actions. Moreover, disaster research has been spread widely among a host of peer-reviewed journals in various disciplines. A substantial portion of the information on disaster management and response currently available resides in the grey literature in the form of after-action reports and projects provided by intergovernmental organisations such as United Nations agencies and non-governmental organisations. Most of the peer-reviewed disaster literature has been in the form of case reports. These factors have contributed to the difficulty in synthesising the findings and have impaired the development of the science of health disaster. The lack of a common terminology for health disaster further impedes the development of the science. Thus, we have not optimised our ability to prevent destructive events from occurring (when possible), mitigate the damage resulting from such events, and/or optimise the responses to a disaster, when they occur. In an effort to provide the structure needed to develop the science associated with disaster health, four frameworks have been proposed in these Guidelines: (1) conceptual; (2) structural; (3) operational; and (4) scientific. The first three frameworks provide the common language and the deconstruction of the elements involved in or present in a disaster scenario. The structural framework is further divided into two main parts, the longitudinal and the transectional structure. The last framework addresses the applicable scientific methods and how to translate this science to the stakeholders to be incorporated into actionable plans. The identification of key generic structures is essential for understanding the pathophysiology of disasters and the preparedness for, as well as the responses to them. Further, the essential concepts of priorities, interrelationships, administration, assessments, identification of needs, selection and planning of interventions, implementation, evaluation, and information are described in separate chapters. A consensus must be sought for a commonly accepted terminology for health disaster research.

Revolutionising engineering education in the Middle East region to promote earthquake-disaster mitigation

Due to the high market demands for professional engineers in the Arab oil-producing countries, the appetite of Middle Eastern students for high-paying jobs and challenging careers in engineering has sharply increased. As a result, engineering programmes are providing opportunities for more students to enrol on engineering courses through lenient admission policies that do not compromise academic standards. This strategy has generated an influx of students who must be carefully educated to enhance their professional knowledge and social capital to assist in future earthquake-disaster risk-reduction efforts. However, the majority of Middle Eastern engineering students are unaware of the valuable acquired engineering skills and knowledge in building the resilience of their communities to earthquake disasters. As the majority of the countries in the Middle East are exposed to seismic hazards and are vulnerable to destructive earthquakes, engineers have become indispensable assets and the first line of defence against earthquake threats. This article highlights the contributions of some of the engineering innovations in advancing technologies and techniques for effective disaster mitigation and it calls for the incorporation of earthquake-disaster-mitigation education into academic engineering programmes in the Eastern Mediterranean region.

Context aware ad hoc network for mitigation of crowd disasters

Our research works focuses on the design and implementation of a novel ubiquitous multi context-aware mobile phone sensing network for mitigation of crowd disasters using machine-to-machine (M2M) communications. A mobile sensor network system integrated with wireless multimedia sensor networks (WMSNs) was designed for effective prediction of a stampede during crowd disasters. This proposed sensor network consists of mobile devices that are used as crowd monitoring participant nodes that employ light sensors, accelerometers, as well as audio and video sensors to collect the relevant data. Real-time crowd dynamics modeling and real-time activity modeling have been achieved by implementing the algorithms developed for Context Acquisition and multi-context fusion. Dynamic crowd monitoring was achieved by implementing the context based region identification and grouping of participants, distributed crowd behavior estimation, and stampede prediction based on distributed consensus. The implementation of the proposed architecture in Android smartphone provides light-weight, easy to deploy, context aware wireless services for effective crowd disaster mitigation and generation of an in time alert to take measures to avoid the occurrence of a stampede. The system has been tested and illustrated within a group of people for stampede prediction by using empirically collected data.

Location-allocation planning of stockpiles for effective disaster mitigation

In the existing framework for receiving and allocating Strategic National Stockpile (SNS) assistance, there are three noticeable delays: the delay by the state in requesting federal assets, the delay in the federal process which releases assets only upon the declaration of a disaster and lastly the time it takes to reach supplies rapidly from the SNS stockpile to where it is needed. The most efficient disaster preparedness plan is one that addresses all three delays taking into account the unique nature of each disaster. In this paper, we propose appropriate changes to the existing framework to address the first two delays and a generic model to address the third which determines the locations and capacities of stockpile sites that are optimal for a specific disaster. Specifically, our model takes into account the impact of disaster specific casualty characteristics, such as the severity and type of medical condition and the unique nature of each type of disaster, particularly with regard to advance warning and factors affecting damage. For disasters involving uncertainty (magnitude/severity) with regard to future occurrences, such as an earthquake, development of appropriate solution strategies involves an additional step using scenario planning and robust optimization. We illustrate the application of our model via case studies for hurricanes and earthquakes and are able to outline an appropriate response framework for each.

An object-based approach for flood area delineation in a transboundary area using ENVISAT ASAR and LANDSAT TM data

The aim of this study was to develop a straightforward approach for flood area mapping in a transboundary riverbed using Geographic Object-Based Image Analysis. Weak bilateral/multilateral cooperation among neighboring countries hampers effective disaster management and mitigation activities over transboundary areas and strengthens the demand for reliable remote-sensing-derived information. Three object-based classification approaches using ENVISAT/ASAR and multi-temporal LANDSAT TM data were developed and validated for flood area delineation. The accuracy assessment of the classification results was based on oblique air photo interpretation and an area-based comparison with the official flood map. The bi-level object-based model using the Normalized Difference Water Index and the original post-flood TM bands attained 92.67% overall accuracy in inundated-areas detection, while the ENVISAT/ASAR classification was the least accurate (85.33%), probably due to the lower spatial resolution of the Synthetic Aperture Radar image. A strong agreement (92.14%) was found between the LANDSAT flood extent and the official flood map, suggesting that the proposed method has the potential to be employed in the future as a standard part of a flood crisis management process.

Wind speed interpolation in the vicinity of the Panama Canal

AbstractA simplified boundary layer (SBL) model formulation is tested against the mesoscale meteorological model MM5 with respect to the 2 km interpolation of hourly surface wind station data for stations in the close vicinity of the Panama Canal. The required short computation time for the real time interpolation of the wind during air pollution incidents involving crossing cargo ships makes the use of simplified wind models an alternative to the full implementation of mesoscale models. The SBL model does take into consideration the land cover of the ground surface, which exhibits substantial variability in the study region. The SBL model produces features of wind speed that are similar to those of the MM5 simulation along the better‐observed Canal centreline. The presence of orographic features makes the applicability of the simplified formulation reasonable only near the Canal where the terrain has small undulations. The simulated wind fields show that the dry season (January to April) is more spatially and temporally coherent than the wet season and that it also has higher wind speeds than the wet season. The evening hours have higher wind speeds than the morning hours in both seasons. The simulated wind exhibits higher average wind speeds and higher frequencies of exceeding 5 m s−1 within the Gatun Lake on the Caribbean side of the Isthmus and the entrance/exit of the Canal on the Caribbean and Pacific coasts. These results are useful for the development of effective disaster mitigation strategies for air pollution events in the region. Copyright © 2011 Royal Meteorological Society

Disaster risk management for critical infrastructure: a services-based viewpoint

It is necessary to protect critical infrastructure and key resources from the effects of a disaster in order to maintain continuity of both public services and private enterprise. Since many of the critical resources are themselves privately owned and operated, however, they are often subject to the same market pressures that force businesses to concentrate on improving the efficiency of their operations at the possible expense of guarding against potential disruptions to those operations. Under these circumstances, the process of designing an effective (and acceptable) disaster mitigation plan for critical infrastructure resources requires a shared understanding of both the business aspects and the technical aspects of different mitigation alternatives. This paper examines the decision-making process behind such disaster mitigation planning from a services standpoint and discusses how taking such a viewpoint can provide a more effective approach to sustainable disaster risk reduction.

Ruapehu Lahar New Zealand 18 March 2007: Lessons for Hazard Assessment and Risk Mitigation 1995-2007

A moderately large lahar caused by a collapse of a tephra dam over the outlet of Crater Lake occurred 11 years and 4 months after the situation that led to it was first recognized. This allowed sufficient time for the considerable period needed by emergency managers and the Government to learn from scientists about the hazard, assess risks in pragmatic and robust ways, debate and progressively mitigate them. Early involvement of a wide range of agencies and the media was encouraged, enabling transfer of knowledge, development of interagency relationships and provided fora for a mitigation strategy to evolve in the face of sometimes controversial mitigation options. Decisions about options were based primarily on maximizing public safety and long-term utility in a valley subject to frequent, sometimes large, past and future lahars. These decisions, which had a significant political component also considered option suitability in a national park setting. A best-practice alarm system was installed based on acoustic flow monitors. A training levee structure was built to protect a highway and other vulnerable infrastructure and a river system near-by, and a key highway bridge raised and strengthened. Response agencies each prepared their own emergency plans which were then integrated and practiced over 3-4 years, incorporating an increasing readiness triggered by a Warning Level system linking to rising lake levels. Execution of the plans progressed smoothly on 18 March. The outcome showed that community resilience to lahars was achieved by adopting long-term solutions, rather than short-term ones, and carefully considering cultural, social, and technological perspectives, especially in a national park setting. Decision-making procedures that give weight to impartial scientific information, as well as values and legislation, are required for effective disaster mitigation, including an acceptance of an appropriate degree of residual risk.

Myanmar's deadly daffodil

Tropical cyclone Nargis wrought havoc in southern Myanmar, with an estimated death toll well above 100,000. Potential future disasters could be alleviated with currently available forecasting skill and effective disaster mitigation plans.

Developing Effective Disaster Mitigation Strategies in São Paulo: Process and Challenges

In Brazil and elsewhere in Latin America, recent attempts have been made to develop effective mitigation strategies to deal with natural and human disasters, especially in urban areas. This article examines the evolution and impact of one such effort undertaken in the Municipality of São Paulo since 1997. With support and technical assistance from the City of Toronto, Canada, and expert advice from several emergency response agencies in Brazil, São Paulo's Centro de Gerênciamento de Emergências was initially envisioned as a “full-service” facility designed both to mitigate the effects of natural and man-made disasters through personnel training and enhanced warning systems and to coordinate effective event response through disaster relief programs and reconstruction/repair activities. Over time, however, CGE's mandate has become increasingly restricted, and currently functions almost exclusively as an early warning system for regional flooding. The study explores the factors underlying this outcome, and assesses the prospects for broader technical cooperation between Canada and Brazil that may help to strengthen mitigation/disaster relief strategies throughout Brazil and elsewhere in Latin America.

The Mass Media and Disaster Awareness in Puerto Rico

Most of the literature about disasters assumes that the media are the most important mitigation tool for manager officials because its content creates disaster and risk awareness. This assumption proposes only three actors in the process of effective disaster management: the government officials that generate disaster information, the media that transmit it, and the public, who receives the information and acts accordingly. A case study of a flood in a rural community in Puerto Rico suggests that this model is inefficient in explaining how disaster awareness is created and how this relates to effective disaster mitigation. The data suggest that the literature fails to recognize important factors that increase or even create vulnerability to hazards. It also neglects other important actors, such as community leaders, and the actions of other groups and institutions that have indirect impact in generating the disaster situation.

Searching for General Principles to Guide the Design of Effective Disaster Mitigation Policy in Developing Countries: Part 2

The attempts it made to determine policies that effectively mitigate disasters and the averse consequences of disasters in developing countries. In this, the second part of this discussion, attention concentrates on considering a range of policies recommendations directed at mitigating the consequences of disasters. The initial section of the discussion concentrates on providing a brief discussion of long-term policies directed at stimulating certain types of real economic growth. Attention then turns to considering a range of shorter-term policy recommendations directed, essentially, at mitigating various types of failures in private market systems. Both efficiency and equity issues are taken into account in this discussion. Assistance-for-work programs are identified as a central component of any efficient and equitable disaster-mitigation policy. It is emphasised, however, that this policy tool wll need to be modified, and/or combined with other relevant policy tools, to make the overall policy program as effective as seems reasonably possible.