Floods part 3 Flashcards
What are the impacts of floods?
Social impacts and economic impacts
What are social impacts?
● Social impacts refer to the effect of an event on the well-being of people.
What are the examples of social impacts?
Injuries, spread of diseases and loss of lives
Homelessness
Disruption to clean water supply
Elaborate on Injuries, spread of diseases and loss of lives
● During floods, people may be injured or killed
○ Objects and debris washed along by fast-moving floodwaters
○ Collapsing buildings
● Floods can affect physical and emotional health
○ Hypothermia (from being caught in the flood for too long)
○ Diseases that are spread due to a flood (e.g. cholera, dysentery, malaria and
dengue fever)
○ Stress from losing one’s home during flood
○ Emotional distress from the loss of loved ones due to flood
How do diseases spread after a flood?
1.
Elaborate on homelessness
● Floodwaters can damage property and sweep houses away
● During floods, people may have to evacuate to emergency shelters and stay there
for a long time
● Flooding in cities tends to affect many people due to the high population densities
● Example: Impact of Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans
○ Severe damage to property
○ Nearly 1.5 million people in New Orleans displaced or left homeless
○ Emergency shelters and trailer parks had to be set up for the flood victims
Elaborate on Disruption to clean water supply
● The supply of clean water may be disrupted due to damaged water pipes
● Water supplies may be contaminated due to burst sewage pipes
● Example: Floods in Pakistan in 2010
● Affected more than 20 million people
● Disrupted water supply in many areas
○ Water supply and sanitation facilities in affected places incurred US$38
million worth of damages
○ Included damages to pump houses, storage tanks, and water pipes,
especially in mountainous regions
What are Economic impacts?
● Economic impacts refer to the effect of an event on goods and services being
produced, sold and bought.
What are examples of economic impact?
Damage to machinery and equipment
Damage to transport infrastructure
Disruption to energy supply
Elaborate on Damage to Machinery and equipment.
● Floods can damage machinery and equipment
○ Equipment that can be damaged includes drilling machines, cranes and
computers
○ Motors and other electrical components of machines and equipment can be
damaged when submerged in water
○ Factories are unable to operate at full capacity and suffer economic losses.
○ Companies may lose profits and have to spend money to buy new
equipment. People may also lose their jobs.
○ Example: The 2011 Thailand floods caused extensive damage to the
manufacturing industry
Elaborate on Damage to transport infrastructure.
● During a flood, transport infrastructure may be submerged or damaged and
become impassable
● Repair of damaged infrastructure may take a long time, and may be costly
● People are unable to travel to work. Tourists are discouraged from visiting the city.
● Overall reduction in productivity, employment and profits.
● Example: Floods in Serbia and Bosnia in August 2014 damaged transport
infrastructure
Elaborate on Disruption to energy supply.
● Floods can disrupt the supply of energy
○ During floods, roads may be damaged or submerged in water
○ Due to impassable roads, trucks may thus not be able to transport petrol
from terminals to gas stations
○ During floods, power lines may be damaged and power outages may occur.
These power failures can last for weeks before they are restored.
○ Due to the lack of electricity, factories and companies are unable to operate.
○ Disruption to energy supply may result in loss of employment and income
for individuals and companies.
