Disaster Readiness and Risk Reduction Notes

Hazard

  • A dangerous phenomenon, substance, human activity, or condition that may cause loss of life, injury, health impacts, property damage, loss of livelihoods and services, social and economic disruption, or environmental damage.

Disaster

  • A serious disruption of the functioning of a community or society involving widespread human, material, economic, or environmental losses and impacts, exceeding the affected community or society's ability to cope using its own resources.

Types of Hazards

  • Man-made
  • Natural

Vulnerability

  • A condition or set of conditions that reduces people’s ability to prepare for, withstand, or respond to a hazard.
    • Susceptibility to hazard

Key Components

  • Hazard
  • Vulnerability
  • Disaster

Capacity

  • The combination of resources, skills, and attributes that a community, organization, or society has to manage and reduce disaster risks.

Exposure

  • The situation of people, infrastructure, housing, production capacities, and other tangible human assets located in hazard-prone areas.

Disaster Example

  • Typhoon Haiyan resulted in a disaster because it hit populated areas at its highest strength,
  • Disasters are a combination of natural and non-natural factors.
  • If a hazard occurs in an area of no exposure, then there is no risk.

Risk

  • The probability that a community’s structure or geographic area is to be damaged or disrupted by the impact of a particular hazard, accounting for its nature, construction, and proximity to a hazardous area.

Disaster Risk

  • The potential loss of life, injury, or damaged assets which could occur to a system, society, or a community in a specific period.
  • Determined probabilistically as a function of hazard, exposure, vulnerability, and capacity.
  • Disaster risk is not only determined by the size and type of hazard; the number of people exposed and their levels of vulnerability matter too.

Factors determining Disaster Risk

  • Hazard: Physical properties of geological or weather phenomena.
    • Examples: Hurricane intensity, earthquake magnitude, heatwave severity, precipitation extremes, drought period.
  • Exposure: People in the path of the hazard.
    • Example: Population density, coastal population, early warning systems, evacuation procedures.
  • Vulnerability: How resilient are those people?
    • Examples: Quake-proof housing, seawalls, access to resources, good governance, resilient agriculture, poverty.

Disaster Risk Formula

\text{Disaster Risk} = \frac{\text{Hazard} \times \text{Exposure} \times \text{Vulnerability}}{\text{Capacity}}

Disaster Risk Factors

  • Conditions or processes that can increase the likelihood or severity of a disaster.
    • Physical
    • Psychological
    • Socio-cultural
    • Economic
    • Political
    • Biological

Physical Factors

  • Tangible objects or infrastructure; availability of fire exits, sturdiness of the building
    • Examples: Following building codes, implementing facility maintenance, suitable equipment for work.

Psychological Factors

  • State of mental capacity and health, perception of self, assessment to respond to disaster, fear
    • Examples: Work and social life balance, self-esteem/self-worth, anxiety.

Socio-cultural Factors

  • Religion, social status, traditions, perception by society
    • Examples: Ethics, values, social impact, education, population.

Economic Factors

  • Assets and liabilities, income, economic class
    • Examples: Cost of living, financial status, source of income, economy.

Political Factors

  • Government structure, diplomatic issues
    • Examples: Government agencies coordination, governance, laws and rights.

Biological Factors

  • Flora and fauna in the environment, health, diseases
    • Examples: Biodiversity loss, excessive hunting, exploitation of natural habitat, epidemic, pandemic.

Natural Hazard: Biological

  • Process of organic origin exposing to pathogenic micro-organisms, toxins, and bioactive substances
    • Examples: Bacteria causing diseases, viruses, parasites, fungi.

Natural Hazard: Geological

  • Natural process originating from the solid earth (geosphere)
    • Examples: Earthquake, landslides, tsunami, volcanic eruption.

Natural Hazard: Hydro-metrological

  • Natural process involving the atmosphere and hydrosphere
    • Examples: Avalanche, drought, flood, wildfire, cyclones, storms, wave surges.

Man-Made and Technological Hazards

  • Originates from technological or industrial conditions, including accidents, dangerous procedures, infrastructure failures, or specific human activities.
    • Examples: War, famine, displaced population, industrial incidents, transport incidents, pollution.

Chernobyl Disaster

  • A nuclear accident that occurred on April 26, 1986, at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Ukraine.
  • Caused by a flawed reactor design and human error during a safety test, leading to a catastrophic explosion and fire that released massive amounts of radioactive material into the atmosphere.

Human Effects of Disasters

  • Displaced Population: People abandon their homes and seek shelter in other regions.
    • A large influx of refugees can disrupt accessibility of health care and education, as well as food supplies and clean water.
  • Health Risk: Severe flooding can result in stagnant water that allows breeding of waterborne bacteria and malaria-carrying mosquito.
    • Without emergency relief, death tolls can rise even after the immediate danger has passed.
  • Food Scarcity: Destroyed crops and loss of agricultural supplies lead to food price increases, reducing families’ purchasing power and increasing the risk of severe malnutrition.
    • The impacts of disaster can be tremendous, causing lifelong damage to children’s development.
  • Emotional Aftershocks: Children develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
    • Left untreated, children suffering from PTSD can be prone to lasting psychological damage and emotional distress.