Tectonic Processes and Hazards EQ2

Question 1

What is a natural hazard?

Answer 1

A perceived natural/geophysical event that has the potential to threaten both life and property

Question 2

What is a natural disaster?

Answer 2

The realisation of a hazard, when it causes significant impact on a vulnerable population

Question 3

What is Degg’s model?

Answer 3

Venn diagram stating that a disaster is the intersection of a hazardous geophysical event, and a vulnerable population

Question 4

Why is vulnerability important?

Answer 4

Vulnerability is directly linked to resilience, and a region’s capacity to cope with tectonic hazards. More vulnerable populations are susceptible to worse impacts from tectonic hazards.

Question 5

What is risk?

Answer 5

The probability of a hazard occurring that leads to the loss of lives and/or livelihood

Question 6

What is resilience?

Answer 6

The ability of a system, community or society exposed to hazards to resist, absorb and recover from the effects of a hazard

Question 7

What is the hazard-risk equation?

Answer 7

risk = hazard x vulnerability/manageability)

Question 7

What is the resilience of a community determined by?

Answer 7

The degree to which the community has the necessary resources and is capable of organising itself both prior to and in times of need

Question 8

What is vulnerability?

Answer 8

The geographical conditions that increases the susceptibility of a community to a hazard or to the impact of a hazard event.

Question 8

What factors explain the complex relationship between risks, hazards and people?

Answer 8

unpredictability of hazards
lack of alternatives
dynamic hazards
cost benefit
‘Russian roulette’ reaction

Question 9

What is the Disaster and Risk age index, what does it show?

Answer 9

Index which highlights the trends of ageing populations and the acceleration of risk in a world that is increasingly exposed to a range of hazard types.
It signals how age should be an important factor in understanding vulnerability and the coping capacity of older generations.

Question 10

A disaster is the intersection of processes generating vulnerability on one side and the natural hazard event on the other

Answer 10

root causes
dynamic pressures
unsafe conditions

Question 10

What is the basis for the Pressure and Release model?

Answer 10

A disaster is the intersection of processes generating vulnerability on one side and the natural hazard event on the other

Question 11

What are some examples of root causes, dynamic pressures and unsafe conditions?

Answer 11

Root causes - limited access to resources. Ideologies
Dynamic pressures - lack of training, local investment. Rapid changes (urbanisation, deforestation)
Unsafe conditions - fragile physical environment, vulnerable society

Question 12

What are the social impacts of tectonic hazards?

Answer 12

death/injury
destruction of homes
displacement, people made homeless

Question 13

What are the economic impacts of tectonic hazards?

Answer 13

buildings/infrastructure damage
economic losses
growth of economy prevented

Question 14

Why are the impacts of tectonic hazards often greater in less developed countries?

Answer 14

Less developed countries = poorly built infrastructure, poor healthcare, lack of resources to properly protect property, overpopulation, poverty
This creates a vulnerable society with a lack of ability to be resilient to tectonic hazards

Question 15

Why are the impacts of earthquakes generally greater than those of volcanoes?

Answer 15

concentration of volcanoes in narrow belts (less than 1% of population exposed to volcanic activity, whereas 5% at risk from earthquakes)
volcanic eruptions have a slower speed of onset and greater spatial predictability
earthquakes cannot be predicted (no diagnostic precursor), there is greater opportunity for volcano mitigation

Question 16

What are the different scales to measure earthquakes?

Answer 16

Richter
Moment Magnitude scale
Mercalli

Question 17

How does the Richter scale measure earthquakes?

Answer 17

Scale = 0-9

Measurement of amplitude of waves produced by an earthquake. It is an absolute scale.

Question 18

How does the Mercalli Scale measure earthquakes?

Answer 18

Scale = I-XII

Measures the experienced impacts of an earthquake. It is a relative scale

Question 19

How does the Moment Magnitude Scale measure earthquakes?

Answer 19

Scale = 0-9

Measurement based on ‘seismic moment’ of the earthquake.

Question 20

What scale is used to measure volcanic eruptions?

Answer 20

Volcanic explosivity index

Question 21

How does the VEI measure volcanic eruptions?

Answer 21

Scale = 0-8

Relative measure of the explosiveness of a volcanic eruption (includes qualititive observations)

Question 22

What is a tectonic hazard profile?

Answer 22

A technique used to try to understand the physical characteristics of different types of hazards

Question 23

What are the characteristics are compared in a tectonic hazard profile?

Answer 23

magnitude
speed of onset
duration
areal extent
spatial predictability
frequency

Question 24

What are the difficulties with hazard profiling?

Answer 24

degree of reliability when comparing different event types
hard to compare across hazard types as they all have different impacts on society and varying spatial and temporal distributions

Question 25

What inequalities can affect vulnerability and resilience?

Answer 25

education
housing
healthcare
income opportunities

Question 26

What is inequality?

Answer 26

Unfair situation or distribution of assets and resources

Question 27

Why do less developed countries find themselves limited by the impacts of tectonic disasters?

Answer 27

Infrastructure is damaged, and livelihoods and savings are destroyed. Death or migration of productive labour force means economy takes a huge hit.
Tectonic disasters worsen development, and make it difficult for recovery to happen in LICs/NEEs

Question 28

Why do more developed countries sometimes actually benefit from tectonic disasters?

Answer 28

Tectonic disasters create a favourable environment for advocacy for disaster-risk reduction measures. Decision makers are also more willing to allocate resources in the wake of a disaster. Reconstruction and rehabilitation create opportunities for integrating disaster-risk measures.

Question 29

What is governance?

Answer 29

The process by which a country/region is run

Question 30

What geographical factors influence vulnerability/resilience?

Answer 30

population density
isolation/accessibility
degree of urbanisation

Question 31

What is economic governance?

Answer 31

Decision-making processes that affect a country’s economic activities and its relationship with other economies.
Major implications for equity, poverty and people’s quality of life

Question 32

What is adminstrative governance?

Answer 32

The system of policy implementation.

Disaster risk reduction = building regulations, landuse planning etc

Question 33

What is political governance?

Answer 33

The process of decision making to create policies, including national disaster reduction and planning