Melanie Gall

WHEN DO LOSSES COUNT?: Six Fallacies of Natural Hazards Loss Data

Current global and national databases that monitor losses from natural hazards suffer from a number of limitations, which in turn lead to misinterpretation and fallacies concerning the “truthfulness” of hazard loss data. These biases often go undetected by end users and are generally a product of the type of information stored in loss databases and how they are constructed. This paper highlights some common shortcomings and root causes for data misinterpretation by asking what biases are present in existing databases and how these then manifest themselves in actual loss figures. For illustrative purposes, four widely used, nonproprietary, Web-based hazard databases are examined: the international Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT), the international Natural Hazards Assessment Network (NATHAN), the Spatial Hazard Events and Losses Database for the United States (SHELDUS), and the National Weather Services Storm Events. We identify six general biases: hazard bias, temporal bias, threshold bias, accounting ...

The Core and Periphery of Emergency Management Networks

Emergency planning and response increasingly involve close interactions between a diverse array of actors across fields (emergency management, public health, law enforcement, etc.); sectors (government, non-profit and for-profit); and levels of government (local, state and federal). This article assesses the temporal dynamics of emergency management networks in two moderately sized communities that have served as large-scale disaster evacuation hosting sites in the past decade. The paper uses two strategies for tracking the evolution of these networks across time. First, we develop a network roster using newspaper and newswire data sources across a decade. Second, we develop a view of the evolution of the networks by analysing emergency operations plans for each community. Analysis of data reveals a contrast between a core set of consistent (mostly governmental) actors and a peripheral set of rapidly turning over (mostly non-governmental) actors – though the account depends on the mode of data on which one focuses. The article concludes with a discussion of the advantage presented by having a two-tier network for evacuation hosting that mixes core and periphery across multiple sectors.

Care of dogs and attitudes of dog owners in Port-au-Prince, the Republic of Haiti.

This article reports the first known study on dogs in Port-au-Prince. Interviews with 1,290 residents provided information on 1,804 dogs. More than 57.7% of homes kept dogs. Not all the dogs received vaccinations for rabies (41.6%), even though 28.2% of households had had a household member bitten by a dog. Although the “owned” dog population had decreased as a result of the earthquake in January 2010, the number of roaming dogs appeared to have been uninfluenced by the disaster. Given that 64.8% of dogs probably had access to the street and only 6.0% of the females were spayed, to humanely contain the dog population will require both confinement and neutering. Although roaming dogs were considered a nuisance by 63.3% of respondents, 42.6% of households fed dogs they did not own.

Flash Flood Risk and the Paradox of Urban Development

AbstractThis paper traces the historic development of flood risk and the antecedent conditions that contributed to the catastrophic consequences in central South Carolina as the result of the 2015 ...

Hazard Mitigation, Economic Development and Resilience: A Comparative Analysis of Flood Control Policy and Practice in Germany, The Netherlands, and Great Britain

Certain parts of Europe have a long history of coastal and riverine flood disasters with major losses of human lives. Structural mitigation practices have reduced direct loss of human life from flood incidents, though not eliminating that particular effect entirely. But over-development in floodplains, population growth patterns in hazard-vulnerable areas and potential consequences of climate change make flood disasters a continued threat. Hazard losses from floods continue to grow and create significant adverse effects on overall economic development. In this chapter we trace developments in flood mitigation (i.e. structural engineering solutions such as barriers and drainage approaches) and flood risk management (i.e. an emphasis on both effective water management practices and sustainable development practices) by considering three European countries with significant coastal and interior vulnerability to the flood hazard: The Netherlands, Great Britain, and Germany. In doing so we consider how flood mitigation and flood risk management is related to hazard loss and economic development. The chapter provides an overview of the degree to which the incentives associated with, and the socio-political effects of economic development imperatives affect hazard mitigation policy choices and their implications for community resilience. Variations in the physical characteristics of the flood hazard across the three countries permit us to consider how underlying management demands posed by the hazard affects policy and practice across individual national settings as well as the European Union in general.