Disaster Flashcards
Define ‘natural hazards’
The natural processes with the potential to affect people’s lives and property
Define ‘disaster’
A serious disruption of the functioning of a community or a society involving widespread human, material, economic or environmental losses and impacts which exceeds the ability of the affected society to cope using its own resources
Define ‘risk’
The probability of harm or loss taking place including death, injury, trauma, damage or loss of property and disruption to economic activity
Why could an earthquake not be a hazard or a risk?
If people are not near the area or in danger
What is the purpose of the Degg’s model?
A venn diagram that shows the interaction between hazards, disaster and human vulnerability
What is disaster vulnerability in Degg’s model?
Physical environment: - unprotected buildings Socio-economic environment: - Poverty - Lack of preparation Local scale: - Lack of training/ food Macro scale: - Population change - Urbanisation - Debt repayment issues - Limited access to power structures
Describe haard events
High winds, floods, drought, landslides, tsunami, volcanic eruption, earthquake, biohazards and pests
Why is there a complex relationship between risk, hazards and people?
- Unpredictability
- Lack of alternatives
- Changing levels of risk
- Russian roulette (‘turn a blind eye’ to risk)
- Cost vs. benefit
Define ‘hazard vulnerability’
The capacity of a person or group to anticipate, cope with, resist and recover from the impact of a natural hazard
What is the risk equation?
Hazard x exposure x (vulnerability/manageability) = lack of coping capacity
What result is low, moderate and high in the risk equation?
-3.9 low
4-6.9 moderate
7+ high
Describe the risk equation of Myanmar
Hazard + exposure = 8.2
Vulnerability = 5.9
Lack of coping capacity = 7.2
Overall risk = 7.0
Factors that affect vulnerability:
- RS
- CI
- GAP
- I
- RoT
- Response system
- Community initiatives
- Government assistant programmes
- Insurance
- Reliance on technology
Factors that affect vulnerability:
- PG
- HE
- U/US
- E
- AP
- Population growth
- Hard engineering
- Urbanisation/ Urban Sprawl
- Economy
- Ageing population
Factors that affect vulnerability:
- ED
- AI
- RoW/E
- Environmental degradation
- Ageing infrastructure
- Reliance of Water/ Electricity
What is physical vulnerability?
When people live in hazard prone areas in buildings with little protection
What is economic vulnerability?
When people risk losing their jobs, assets and money
What is social vulnerability?
When a household or community is unable to support the disadvantaged groups within it e.g. political isolation
What is knowledge vulnerability?
When people lack education and training and/or there are a lack of warning systems
What is environmental vulnerability?
When the area people live in has increased in hazard risk because of population pressure forcing people into riskier areas
Factors that affect resilience:
- DPR
- A
- R
- W
- Doctor to patient ratio
- Attitude
- Revenue
- Wealth
Factors that affect resilience:
- RUM
- PP
- PoD
- EP
- Rural to urban migration
- Pre-planning
- Perception of the disaster
- Emergency procedures
Factors that affect resilience:
- TA
- MSS
- DR
- S
- Trade agreements
- Medical services and supplies
- Debt repayments
- Skills
Factors that affect resilience:
- C
- PG
- OPR
- ED
- Communications
- Population growth
- Open political regime
- Environmental degradation
What is the PAR model?
What should be enforced to reduce the risk of a disaster
Name the four components of the PAR model
Root causes, dynamic pressures, unsafe conditions and natural hazards
Describe root causes of the PAR model
Limited access to power, structures and resources
Ideologies: political and economic systems
Describe dynamic pressures of the PAR model
Lack of skills, training, local investment, press freedom and ethical standards
Macro forces: population change, urbanisation, deforestation, arms expenditure and debt repayment
Describe unsafe conditions of the PAR model
- Fragile physical environment
- Fragile local economy
- Vulnerability
- Public actions
What equation comes between {root causes, dynamic pressures, unsafe conditions} and {natural hazards}?
Risk = hazard + vulnerability
What are hazard profiles?
A technique used to understand the physical characteristics of types of hazards used to contrast and rank the risks
Describe the Haiti earthquake 2010
- When?
- Death toll and buildings destroyed
- Cause
- Magnitude
- Vulnerability
24th January and 52 aftershocks
Death toll estimated 316k
30,000 buildings destroyed including Port-au-Prince, cathedral, Palace, UN HQ, jail and parliament buildings
City was in recovery from 2 tropical storms and 2 hurricanes since 2008
Magnitude 7
Describe the aid and impacts of the Haiti 2010 earthquake
- Loss of comms and roads blocked by debris
- Failure of electricity power system caused lack of aid
- Rescue efforts ceased before 2 weeks
- Over 1 million homeless and corpses stacked in streets, thousands of prisoners escaped
- Cholera killed 9,200 UN blamed
Describe the cause and impacts of the Sichuan earthquake of 2008
- Magnitude 7.9
- Collision of Indian-Australian and Eurasian plates
- E90,000 dead including 5,300 children
- 200 relief workers died in landslides
- Millions homeless
- Repairs of £76bn creating 1m jobs to build 169 hospitals
Describe the impacts and vulnerability of the 2011 Japanese earthquake
- Magnitude 9 and tsunami
- 6 years on 150k evacuees
- Cost £235bn
- 1 minute warning
- Only 58% headed for high ground (underestimated personal risk)
