Tectonic Hazards EQ2 - Tectonic disasters

Question 1

What is a natural hazard?

Answer 1

A perceived nautral/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 vulnerability?

Answer 7

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

Question 8

What is the resilience of a community determined by?

Answer 8

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 9

What is the hazard-risk equation?

Answer 9

risk = hazard x vulnerability/manageability)

Question 10

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

Answer 10

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

Question 11

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

Answer 11

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 12

What is the basis for the Pressure and Release model?

Answer 12

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

Question 13

What 3 factors are involved in the progression of vulnerability from the PAR model?

Answer 13

1. root causes
2. dynamic pressures
3. unsafe conditions

Question 14

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

Answer 14

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 15

What are the social impacts of tectonic hazards?

Answer 15

• death/injury
• destruction of homes
• displacement, people made homeless

Question 16

What are the economic impacts of tectonic hazards?

Answer 16

• buildings/infrastructure damage
• economic losses
• growth of economy prevented

Question 17

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

Answer 17

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 18

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

Answer 18

• 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 19

What are the different scales to measure earthquakes?

Answer 19

Richter
Moment Magnitude scale
Mercalli

Question 20

How does the Richter scale measure earthquakes?

Answer 20

Scale = 0-9

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

Question 21

How does the Mercalli Scale measure earthquakes?

Answer 21

Scale = I-XII

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

Question 22

How does the Moment Magnitude Scale measure earthquakes?

Answer 22

Scale = 0-9

Measurement based on ‘seismic moment’ of the earthquake.

Question 23

What scale is used to measure volcanic eruptions?

Answer 23

Volcanic Explosivity Index

Question 24

How does the VEI measure volcanic eruptions?

Answer 24

Scale = 0-8

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

Question 25

What is a tectonic hazard profile?

Answer 25

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

Question 26

What characteristics are compared in a tectonic hazard profile?

Answer 26

• magnitude
• speed of onset
• duration
• areal extent
• spatial predictability
• frequency

Question 27

What are the difficulties with hazard profiling?

Answer 27

• 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 28

What inequalities can affect vulnerability and resilience?

Answer 28

Inequalities in access to:

• education
• housing
• healthcare
• income opportunities

Question 29

What is inequality?

Answer 29

Unfair situation or distribution of assets and resources

Question 30

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

Answer 30

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 31

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

Answer 31

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 32

What is governance?

Answer 32

The process by which a country/region is run

Question 33

What geographical factors influence vulnerability/resilience?

Answer 33

• population density
• isolation/accessibility
• degree of urbanisation

Question 34

What is economic governance?

Answer 34

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 35

What is adminstrative governance?

Answer 35

The system of policy implementation.

Disaster risk reduction = building regulations, landuse planning etc

Question 36

What is political governance?

Answer 36

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