EPICentre

This stream of EPICentre's work focuses on the assessment, management and understanding of risk in both societal and scientific contexts. The work can be divided broadly into two complementary strands: one focusing on risk representation and behavioural response in individuals and communities, and the other on risk quantification.

Our work on risk representation and behavioural response examines how people in seismically vulnerable cultures represent the earthquake threat. We have done extensive work in understanding how the public sees earthquake risk in Seattle, USA, Osaka, Japan and Izmir, Turkey. We have found that a range of emotional factors shape their conceptualisations, as do socio-culturally specific factors. Thus we are well versed in the barriers and facilitators of preparedness, in peoples' mind-sets, in a range of cultures. Recently, we have branched out in a number of ways. We have moved into looking at multi-hazard responses, like earthquakes and fires, and more pertinently, into how to intervene to better prepare people at-risk for these threats. To this end we have devised the fix-it intervention for earthquake and fire preparedness in Seattle and Izmir [1, 2] and have implemented this. Furthermore, we have also branched into examining expert understandings, particularly how seismology itself is conceived by seismologists. What is its aim? What should its focus be? We have found that prediction is regarded as a stigmatised endeavour by many working in seismology; they emphasise the importance of working towards mitigation rather than prediction [3].

To complement the research above, we work on the quantification of risk using modern statistical methods. A key challenge here is the treatment of uncertainty, which arises either from intrinsic unpredictability of a system or from imperfect understanding. Uncertainty assessment, often within a modern Bayesian framework, therefore runs through much of the work carried out by Epicentre staff. Expertise includes the modelling of probability distributions governing the frequency of occurrence of natural disasters such as earthquakes; accounting for the limitations of both data and models when determining the impacts of natural disasters upon the built environment and the resulting economic and societal consequences; and the combination of sometimes conflicting information from multiple sources in a transparent and defensible manner so that the results can support decision-making. Close connections with colleagues in the UCL Statistical Science Department ensure that Epicentre's approaches to uncertainty quantification are state-of-the-art.

Most recently, we have moved into the field of resilient recovery from disasters. From a mix of a psycho-social, WASH (water-and-sanitation-hygiene) and structural engineering perspective, we address how to make communities and structures more resilient in disaster prone areas. We use schools as hubs in relation to which our measures can be applied due to their importance in local people’s lives [4]. We have developed a range of tools for assessing the needs and perspectives of local stakeholders, and have developed successful interventions to improve psycho-social as well as WASH and structural resilience. We have found song to be a particularly powerful resource in developing psycho-social resilience in teenage girls in disaster prone areas.

Disaster recovery is relatively under-researched and there are many gaps in our knowledge and understanding. The old notions of disasters as an interruption in development, and of recovery as linear progress towards a restoration of pre-disaster normality, are being superseded by more sophisticated understanding. It is now recognised that recovery is complex, exhibiting multiple and diverse patterns of change, and having no fixed end point. Moreover, it takes place in a 'new normality': a context that is, to some extent, irreversibly altered by the disaster itself. New insights into reconstruction and recovery processes are emerging, but the empirical evidence is patchy, and as a result we are still some way from establishing broad, coherent theories.

Members of EPICentre have been involved in several initiatives in this area of disaster studies in recent years. These include empirical research into long-term post-disaster change, the influence of short-term decision making on longer-term reconstruction pathways, and investigation of alternative approaches to supporting people left homeless by disaster. EPICentre members have also supported disaster shelter response (most recently in Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines in 2014) and taken part in a number of post-disaster reconnaissance missions (including the 2009 L'Aquila earthquake in Italy and 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in Japan) to look at reconstruction processes from an engineering perspective.

EPICentre plans to put more emphasis on this area of disaster studies. The aim is to understand recovery drivers and processes better, particularly in urban areas, and hence to inform post-disaster policy and practice for quicker and more effective recovery. Research will be informed by a socio-technical systems perspective that sees physical reconstruction and socio-economic recovery as linked processes. Operational and policy-making institutions will be sought out as partners.

Cities are composed of complex and interdependent social and physical infrastructure systems, which can be affected by natural hazards in several ways. Within EPICentre we are undertaking research to:

1. Shed new light on natural hazard characteristics and how they are modified by their interaction with the built environment;
2. Better characterise the response of individual infrastructure systems to single and multiple hazards;
3. Study the change in vulnerability that occurs in cities when exposure changes (e.g. with urban development);
4. Investigate how interdependency of infrastructure systems affect the vulnerability of cities to natural hazards, and their ability to respond to these events;
5. Understand the effectiveness of large scale mitigation interventions on city vulnerability to natural hazards;

This works spans a number of different main and triggered hazards, and we are expanding our research portfolio to look at how people act within a city in the event of natural hazards and the role of hazard forecasts. 

From an engineering perspective, EPICentre staff use analytical, numerical, experimental, observational, expert elicitation and advanced statistical approaches to develop the knowledge and tools necessary for the assessment and strengthening of buildings and infrastructure under natural hazards. This is a particular strength of EPICentre and research is moving away from traditional engineering resistance analysis towards seeking solutions for the mitigation of functionality loss for improved societal resilience. Research in this area has to date concentrated on the hazards of earthquakes, tsunami, floods, wind and fire, with approaches being developed and applied for assessing individual structures, populations of buildings, lifeline components and networks.

From a more social science perspective, significant work has been undertaken by EPICentre to investigate social and physical metrics of resilience, and on the interplay between different stakeholders and infrastructure systems in the face of natural hazards.

Heritage and historic buildings should be safeguarded against ageing and other external threats via robust, evidence and observation based conservation strategies. Conservation of these priceless buildings and archaeological sites not only contributes to the preservation of our cultural heritage but also ensures that the technical knowledge they embody will not be lost. To achieve this, EPICentre's conservation engineering team works on condition assessment of historic buildings, diagnosis of structural and material damage, performance appraisal, using a multi hazard approach. Such hazards  include seismicity and climate-induced threats such as flooding, wind-driven rain and thermal loading. EPICentre staff employ their expertise on a wide range of tools and methods including, but not limited to, on-site surveys, non-destructive techniques, laboratory testing, computer modelling, dynamic testing, and environmental monitoring. 

EPICentre staff have worked on a multitude of historic buildings and sites around the world from the UK to Italy, Turkey, Algeria, Jordan, Nepal and the Philippines. Based on our holistic approach, tailored case-specific strengthening and retrofitting solutions are developed on a case by case basis. For the retrofit of historic rubble masonry churches exposed to seismic hazard we have developed in collaboration with industry a patented dissipative device to be mounted with metallic ties.