Natural Hazards, Unnatural Disasters: The Anatomy of Risk in a Dynamic World

Description

Globally, two-thirds of deaths arising from natural hazards in recent decades were caused by geological hazards. But how and why do natural hazards turn into disasters? In this talk, we will address this question through the lens of one particularly troublesome hazard: earthquakes. In an earthquake, it is not the act of ground shaking that affects people, but the fatal attraction of gravity as buildings and infrastructure crumble and collapse. This talk will compare global trends in earthquake fatalities and aim to extract common themes that exacerbate the impact of natural hazards, and consider where and why these turn into disasters. Unfortunately, the real world rarely consists of singular hazards. Many places are subject to a suite of natural hazards that can be triggered or coincide in time and space. We will explore how even simple multi-hazard cascades lead to dramatic changes in exposure and vulnerability, resulting in extremely variable disaster risk profiles. We will see how playing the game with hazard scenarios can help identify systemic vulnerabilities in at-risk communities and give an insight into the complex disaster risk decision-making landscape.