New Stuff from the Natural Hazards Center
2002 Session Summaries Now Available
In many ways, September 11 changed the way researchers, practitioners, and others interested in hazards and disasters view the world. In many ways it did not. As hazards professionals from around the world gathered in Boulder, Colorado, in July, to participate in the 27th Annual Hazards Research and Applications Workshop,
many of the discussions focused on how the lessons of the past help inform our future and whether terrorism should usurp our long-standing concern with hazard mitigation. Participants at the Workshop focused on cutting-edge hazards issues, ranging from the shifting concerns and cross-cutting lessons of September 11 to the impacts of Hurricane Andrew 10 years later. Other topics included wildfire mitigation, coordinating research, higher education, El Nino, tsunami hazards, mapping risk, and land use.
To ensure that the ideas and discussions generated are shared with those who did not attend the workshop, the Natural Hazards Center publishes brief summaries of each session, abstracts of the hazards research presented, and descriptions of the projects and programs discussed at the meeting. A set of all workshop materials, including the agenda, participant list, and workshop notebook, is available for $25.00, plus $5.00 shipping. (For more detailed ordering information, contact the Publications Administrator at the address below).
Currently, the list of all session summaries is available on-line at http://www.colorado.edu/hazards/ss/ss.html. In the near future, the complete text of all session summaries and abstracts will also be available at that site.
To order these materials, send your payment (written to the University of Colorado) to the Publications Administrator, Natural Hazards Research and Applications Information Center, 482 UCB, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309-0482; (303) 492-6819; fax: (303) 492-2151; e-mail: janet.kroeckel@colorado.edu; http://www.colorado.edu/hazards. Checks should be in U.S. dollars and written on a U.S. bank. Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Diner’s Club cards are also accepted.
Our Latest Quick Response Report
Although much of the information regarding September 11 deals with the events in New York City and Washington, D.C., the small town of Shanksville, Pennsylvania, also suffered a terrible blow with the crash of United Flight 93. Our latest Quick Response report, Terrorism in Shanksville: A Study in Preparedness and Response, by Nancy K. Grant, David H. Hoover, Annemarie Scarisbrick-Hauser, and Stacy L. Muffet of the University of Akron, examines the extent to which response to a disaster in a small town/rural area involving multiple emergency response jurisdictional entities is enhanced by:
- serious attention to exercising existing emergency response plans, and
- personal knowledge of and trust in fellow emergency responders, especially those in charge.
Further, because the tragedy was created by a terrorist act, the researchers wanted to know if control of the site by an outside organization (the FBI) impacted the effectiveness of disaster response and mutual trust among local responders. The team also wanted to examine the extent to which the phenomenon of convergence, where substantial assistance from outside the local jurisdiction arrives, conformed to prior research and theory.
The researchers concluded that previous multi-jurisdictional exercises and responses to other emergencies did indeed enhance the response to the crash. They also noted that, although the FBI was relatively unfamiliar with the concerns of local responders and local response agencies were not fully aware of FBI objectives, the two groups were able to work together to complete their missions. The influx of donations and volunteers matched previous experiences.
Copies of Quick Response Report #157 are free from the Natural Hazards Center’s web site: http://www.colorado.edu/hazards/qr/qr157/qr157.html. Printed copies are avail-able for purchase for $5.00 each from the Publications Administrator at the address above. A complete list of all Quick Response Reports can be found at http://www.colorado.edu/hazards/qr/qr.html.
Please Apply
If you are a researcher interested in studying a disaster within hours or days of the event, here is an opportunity for you. The Natural Hazards Center is now soliciting proposals for its FY 2003 Quick Response (QR) Research Program, which enables social scientists from the U.S. to conduct short-term studies immediately after a disaster in order to collect data that would otherwise be lost.
Applicants with approved proposals are eligible to receive funding to carry out their investigation, should an appropriate disaster occur in the coming 12 months. Grants average between $1,000 and $3,000 and essentially cover food, lodging, and travel expenses. In return, grantees must submit a report of their findings, which is published by the Natural Hazards Center both on the World Wide Web and in hard copy.
Details about proposal submission can be obtained from the center’s web site: http://www.colorado.edu/hazards/qr2003.html, or by requesting a "2003 QR Program Announcement" from Mary Fran Myers, Co-Director, Natural Hazards Center, 482 UCB, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309-0482; (303) 492-6818; fax: (303) 492-2151; e-mail: myersmf@colorado.edu. The deadline for proposal submission is October 16, 2002.
Table of Contents for This Issue of the Natural Hazards Observer
