Seasonal Forecasting for Climate Hazards: Prospects and Responses

One of the most promising developments for early warning of climate hazards is seasonal climate forecasting. Already forecasts are operational in many parts of the tropics and sub-tropics, particularly for droughts and floods associated with ENSO events. Prospects for further development of seasonal forecasting for a range of climatichazards are reviewed, illustrated with case studies in Africa, Australia, the U.S.A. and Europe. A critical evaluation of the utility of seasonal forecasts centres on vulnerability, communicationchannels, and effective responses. In contrast to short-term prediction, seasonal forecasts raise new issues of preparedness and the use of information.     

IFKIS-Hydro: an early warning and information system for floods and debris flows

IFKIS-Hydro is an information and warning system for hydrological hazards in small- and medium-scale catchments. The system collects data such as weather forecasts, precipitation measurements, water level gauges, discharge simulations and local observations of event-specific phenomena. In addition, IFKIS-Hydro incorporates a web-based information platform, which serves as a central hub for the submission and overview of data. Special emphasis is given to local information. This is accomplished particularly by human observers. In medium-scale catchments, discharge forecast models have an increasing importance in providing valuable information. IFKIS-Hydro was developed in several test regions in Switzerland and the first results of its application are available now. The system is constantly extended to additional regions and may become the standard for warning systems in smaller catchments in Switzerland.     

基于WEBGIS和实时降雨信息的区域地质灾害预警预报系统

基于WEBGIS平台,根据浙江省地质灾害大调查和补充调查资料,结合浙江省气象台提供的雨季实时降雨量与降雨量预测信息,建立了浙江省突发性地质灾害预警预报系统。该系统目的在于：（1）建立浙江省突发性地质灾害信息库管理系统,实现对突发性地质灾害点分布和灾情信息的图形和数据一体化管理;（2）建立基于网络或其它通讯方式的滑坡（泥石流）灾害实时预警预报系统,实现与气象部门的连接,根据雨季的实时降雨预报和雨量资料,对浙江省滑坡（泥石流）灾害发生的空间范围进行实时发布。该系统核心是地质灾害预警预报模块,而模块是在区域地质灾害空间预测的基础上,结合实时的气象动态信息,研究在不同地质环境和不同气象条件下地质灾害体发生的规律,以提高区域地质灾害的预报精度。2004年的5月底到7月初的雨季中进行了试运行,该系统的预测情况与地质灾害的实际发生情况吻合性较好,表明预测方法和模型是基本可行的,且可操作性强。     

Avalanche Hazard Mitigation Strategies Assessed by Cost Effectiveness Analyses and Cost Benefit Analyses—evidence from Davos,Switzerland

This paper demonstrates the application of cost effectiveness analysis and cost benefit analysis to alternative avalanche risk reduction strategies in Davos, Switzerland. The advantages as well as limitations of such analysis for natural hazards planning are discussed with respect to 16 avalanche risk reduction strategies. Scenarios include risk reduction measures that represent the main approaches to natural hazards planning in Switzerland, such as technical, organisational, and land use planning measures. The methodologies used outline how concepts and techniques from risk analysis, hazard mapping, Geographic Information System, and economics can be interdisciplinary combined. The results suggest important considerations, such as possible sources of uncertainty due to different choices in the calculation of cost effectiveness ratio and net present value. Given the parameters and assumptions, it seems as if the current approach to avalanche risk reduction in the study area approximates to economic and cost efficiency and serves the aim of reducing risk to human fatalities.     

Database of geo-hydrological disasters for civil protection purposes

This paper presents the results of a research concerning available historical information about natural hazards (landslides and floods) and consequent disasters in the Consortium of Mountain Municipalities of Valtellina di Tirano, in Northern Italy. A geo-referenced database, collecting information till 2008, was designed with the aim of using available data of historical events for hazard estimation and the definition of risk scenarios as a basis for Civil Protection planning and emergency management purposes. This database and related statistics about landslides and floods are shown, and a brief overview of historical disasters caused by natural hazards in the study area is presented. A case study showing how useful the database can be to define a simple but realistic scenario is described. Information availability and reliability is discussed and possible uncertainties are underlined. The study shows that collecting and making use of historical information for the definition of hypothetical scenarios and the evaluation of territorial threats is a fundamental source of knowledge to deal with future emergencies.     

区域滑坡灾害预测预警与风险评价

区域滑坡灾害预测预警是滑坡灾害研究领域的难点和热点。过去10多年来在这方面的研究主要集中在区域降雨与地质环境的结合方面。文章总结了目前国内外滑坡灾害预测预报、预警和风险管理研究现状,认为把滑坡灾害预警预报与风险管理相结合是减灾防灾的需要,也是今后该领域研究的发展趋势。文章从区域滑坡灾害空间预测、时间预警预报的角度提出了滑坡灾害预测预报的分类和理论基础,并在此基础上,利用MapGIS软件平台进行二次开发,建立了基于WebGIS的滑坡灾害信息管理系统和实时预警发布系统。以2004年"云娜"台风期间浙江省永嘉县滑坡灾害预警预报为例,进行了滑坡危险性预测、人口易损性预测、经济易损性预测到风险预测的实例研究。     

NOAA Weather Radio (NWR) – A Coastal Solution to Tsunami Alert and Notification

The Washington State/Local Tsunami Work Group adopted the NOAA Weather Radio All-Hazards Warning System to warn citizens quickly and effectively of not only tsunami hazards but also other natural or man-made hazards. In concert with an array of deep ocean tsunami detectors, land-based seismic sensors, and warning messages issued by the tsunami warning centers, NWR provides a means to expeditiously get critical decision-making information to emergency managers, elected officials, and first responders. To implement the NWR strategy effectively, a partnership was developed to add a repeater to the NWR system to provide complete coverage to the coast of Washington and to shipping lanes off the coast. The Work Group also recognized the need to disseminate time critical hazard information on tsunamis to the public on beaches and in high traffic areas, so it developed a new notification system, with the first prototype installed on 2 July 2003 in Ocean Shores, Washington. A public education program also was developed to improve the impacted communities understanding of the tsunami hazard, the warning system, and actions they should take if a tsunami occurs.     

地质灾害信息系统研究——以重庆市丰都县为例

近10年来,随着信息科学和计算机技术的快速发展,地理信息系统的开发应用研究越来越广泛,地质灾害信息系统是地理信息系统在地质灾害领域的应用研究.本文在简要介绍地质灾害信息系统基本内容和功能的基础上,以重庆市丰都县地质灾害信息系统建设为例,从地质灾害空间数据库建设、空间分析模块、群测群防监测预警体系和信息管理模块等方面论述区域地质灾害信息系统建设的基本步骤和应用功能,为丰都县地质灾害信息管理的系统化和规范化提供技术支撑体系,也为其它地区的类似研究提供范例.     

A method for na-tech risk assessment as supporting tool for land use planning mitigation strategies

Hazardous industrial sites have always represented a threat for the community often provoking major accidents overcoming the boundaries of the plants and affecting the surrounding urban areas. If the industrial sites are located in natural hazard-prone areas, technological accidents may be triggered by natural events, generating so-called na-tech events which may modify and increase the impact and the overall damage in the areas around them. Nevertheless, natural and technological hazards are still treated as two separate issues, and up to now the methods for na-tech risk assessment have been developed mainly for specific natural hazards, generally restricted to some plant typologies and to the area of the plant itself. Based on a review of the current na-tech literature, this article illustrates a risk assessment method as a supporting tool for land use planning strategies aimed at reducing na-tech risk in urban areas. More specifically, a multi attribute decision-making method, combined with fuzzy techniques, has been developed. The method allows planners to take into account, according to different territorial units, all the individual na-tech risk factors, measured through both quantitative and qualitative parameters, while providing them with a na-tech risk index, useful to rank the territorial units and to single out the priority intervention areas. The method is designed to process information generally available about hazardous plants (safety reports), natural hazards (hazard maps) and features of urban systems mainly influencing their exposure and vulnerability to na-tech events (common statistical territorial data). Furthermore, the method implemented into a GIS framework should easily provide planners with comparable maps to figure out the hazard factors and the main territorial features influencing the exposure and vulnerability of urban systems to na-tech events. The method has been tested on a middle-sized Municipality in the Campania Region, identified as 2nd class seismic zone, according to the Ordinance 3274/2003, in which a LPG storage plant, classified as a plant with major accident potential by the Seveso II Directive (art. 9), is located just within the city core.     

浙江省永嘉县区域滑坡灾害人口易损性评价和伤亡风险预测

区域滑坡灾害人口易损性及人口伤亡风险预测研究是区域滑坡灾害预警预报工作的一个重要环节,该研究对提高预警预报工作的针对性和有效性具有关键作用.在对浙江省永嘉县有关资料进行分析的基础上,从研究区人口年龄结构、居民对滑坡灾害风险的防范意识、政府对滑坡灾害的重视程度及滑坡灾害预警预报体系的完善程度4个方面评价了研究区人口易损性,并给出了计算人口易损性的公式,据此得到了永嘉县人口易损性分布图.根据永嘉县的实际情况,提出了耕地人口密度的概念.综合人口易损性分布图、人口密度分布图和滑坡灾害易发性预测图得到了研究区受威胁人口伤亡风险预测图,为当地政府职能部门实施滑坡灾害风险的控制和管理提供决策依据.     

Understanding the vulnerability of migrants in Shanghai to typhoons

China has experienced considerable migration from inland to coastal areas since the reforms of 1978, with migrants becoming an important population in many coastal cities. Compared with non-migrants (long-term residents), migrant vulnerability to typhoons is considered high due to limited access to job opportunities, social security, information, and other resources; however, there is no research on vulnerability of this population sector to natural hazards. This initial study analysed the perceptions and personal experiences of migrants living in Shanghai of typhoon hazards. During May 2010, empirical data were collected using an online questionnaire and face–face interviews. Response data indicated that risk knowledge of migrants was significantly lower than among non- migrants; differing risk perceptions between the groups were consistent with levels of personal typhoon experience; statistically significant differences in hazard knowledge within the sample also related to education and occupation; a variety of strategies to cope with typhoon hazards was being applied by residential committees; and that migrants were not generally recognised as a vulnerable group requiring special consideration in hazard risk management. To reduce the vulnerability of migrants to typhoons, we recommend expanding the range of accessible communication technologies distributing warning information; organising more educational and training programmes, at government and corporate level, to increase community awareness of natural hazards; encouraging local residential committees to promote social networks and engagement for migrants; and providing corporate incentives to develop insurances specifically for migrant needs. Further research is necessary to assess the differences in vulnerability between different types of migrants.     

Land-use planning for natural hazards in New Zealand: the setting,barriers, ‘burning issues’ and priority actions

Land-use planners have a critical role to play in building vibrant, sustainable and hazard resilient communities in New Zealand. The policy and legal setting for natural hazards planning provides a solid foundation for good practice. But there are many examples of ‘bad practice’ that result in unnecessary risks and, in some cases, exposure to repeat events and potentially devastating impacts. Much, therefore, remains to be done to improve hazards planning policy and practice in New Zealand. This article explores the questions: What role does land-use planning play in managing hazard risks in New Zealand; and what needs to be done to reduce hazard risks and build community resilience? The article starts by describing the milieu within which natural hazards planning takes place. It goes onto outline the stakeholders and institutional and legal setting for natural hazards planning in New Zealand, including barriers to realising the potential of natural hazards planning. This synthesis reveals a number of ‘burning issues’, including the need to: (a) Improve understanding about the nature of hazards; (b) Prioritise risk avoidance (reduction) measures; (c) Provide national guidance for communities exposed to repeat events and address the relocation issue and (d) Mainstream climate change adaptation. Each ‘burning issue’ is discussed, and priority actions are recommended to realise the potential of land-use planning to reduce natural hazard risks and build community resilience in New Zealand. Ultimately, the challenge is to develop a cooperative hazards governance approach that is founded on coordinated policies, laws and institutions, cooperative professional practice and collaborative communities.     

地质灾害预报预警水平的评价

预报预警是防灾减灾的重要手段。目前,我国及各省(直辖市)、自治区广泛开展了地质灾害-气象预报预警工作。因此,对其水平进行科学评价已成为一个重要的研究课题。论文在前人研究的基础上,分析我国地质灾害预报预警现状及对预报预警水平评价时存在的问题,用预报预警成功率衡量预报预警水平,并建立系统的地质灾害预报预警水平评价体系;从地质灾害预报预警需解决的基本问题出发,在充分考虑地质灾害发生“时、空、强”3要素的预报预警范围对预报预警成功率的影响后,相继建立了地质灾害“时、空、强”预报预警成功率、某次灾害预报预警成功率及某时段内地质灾害预报预警成功率模型;在该模型基础上,分别建立某次及某时段内地质灾害预报预警水平整体评价模型。论文提出的评价体系及评价模型符合我国目前地质灾害预报预警现状,为地质灾害预报预警水平评价提供了一条思路。     

Visualization of uncertainty in natural hazards assessments using an interactive cartographic information system

Natural hazard assessments are always subject to uncertainties due to missing knowledge about the complexity of hazardous processes as well as their natural variability. Decision-makers in the field of natural hazard management need to understand the concept, components, sources, and implications of existing uncertainties in order to reach informed and transparent decisions. Until now, however, only few hazard maps include uncertainty visualizations which would be much needed for an enhanced communication among experts and decision-makers in order to make informed decisions possible. In this paper, an analysis of how uncertainty is currently treated and communicated by Swiss natural hazards experts is presented. The conducted expert survey confirmed that the communication of uncertainty has to be enhanced, possibly with the help of uncertainty visualizations. However, in order to visualize the spatial characteristics of uncertainty, existing uncertainties need to be quantified. This challenge is addressed by the exemplary simulation of a snow avalanche event using a deterministic model and quantified uncertainties with a sensitivity analysis. Suitable visualization methods for the resulting spatial variability of the uncertainties are suggested, and the advantages and disadvantages of their implementation in an interactive cartographic information system are discussed.     

新疆及中亚地区斜坡灾害研究现状与展望

新疆和中亚五国山河相连,都是“一带一路”建设的重要支点,但也是滑坡、泥石流等斜坡灾害的高发区,且两地的地质灾害发育有着明显的共性。本文对新疆和中亚地区的斜坡灾害研究现状进行综述,分析了两地斜坡灾害形成机理、发育规律,即中高山地分布集中,受降雨和冰雪融水影响很大,黄土滑坡发育。新疆的斜坡灾害研究多围绕公路、水利等工程设施;中亚地区的斜坡灾害研究以自然灾害居多,且在很大程度上受地震作用控制。最后,分析了新疆及中亚地区斜坡灾害研究的发展趋势,建议建立现代化的灾害监测预警系统,加强“一带一路”沿线国家地质灾害研究的国际合作。     

Undersampling power-law size distributions: effect on the assessment of extreme natural hazards

The effect of undersampling on estimating the size of extreme natural hazards from historical data is examined. Tests using synthetic catalogs indicate that the tail of an empirical size distribution sampled from a pure Pareto probability distribution can range from having one-to-several unusually large events to appearing depleted, relative to the parent distribution. Both of these effects are artifacts caused by limited catalog length. It is more difficult to diagnose the artificially depleted empirical distributions, since one expects that a pure Pareto distribution is physically limited in some way. Using maximum-likelihood methods and the method of moments, we estimate the power-law exponent and the corner size parameter of tapered Pareto distributions for several natural hazard examples: tsunamis, floods, and earthquakes. Each of these examples has varying catalog lengths and measurement thresholds, relative to the largest event sizes. In many cases where there are only several orders of magnitude between the measurement threshold and the largest events, joint two-parameter estimation techniques are necessary to account for estimation dependence between the power-law scaling exponent and the corner size parameter. Results indicate that whereas the corner size parameter of a tapered Pareto distribution can be estimated, its upper confidence bound cannot be determined and the estimate itself is often unstable with time. Correspondingly, one cannot statistically reject a pure Pareto null hypothesis using natural hazard catalog data. Although physical limits to the hazard source size and attenuation mechanisms from source to site constrain the maximum hazard size, historical data alone often cannot reliably determine the corner size parameter. Probabilistic assessments incorporating theoretical constraints on source size and propagation effects are preferred over deterministic assessments of extreme natural hazards based on historical data.     

Earthquake-and-landslide events are associated with more fatalities than earthquakes alone

Natural hazards are natural processes of the complex Earth system and may interact and affect each other. Often a single hazard can trigger a subsequent, different hazard, such as earthquakes triggering landslides. The effect of such cascading hazards has received relatively little attention in the literature. The majority of previous research has focused on single hazards in isolation, and even multi-hazard risk assessment currently does not account for the interaction between hazards, therefore ignoring potential amplification effects. Global earthquake-and-landslide fatality data were used to model cascading events to explore relationships between the number of fatalities during single and cascading events and covariates. A multivariate statistical approach was used to model the relationship between earthquake fatalities and several covariates. The covariates included earthquake magnitude, gross domestic product, slope, poverty, health, access to cities, exposed population to earthquake shaking, building strength and whether a landslide was triggered or not. Multivariate regression analysis showed the numbers of earthquake fatalities are significantly affected by whether a subsequent landslide is triggered or not.     

城市突发性地质灾害应急系统探讨

城市突发性地质灾害是当今减灾的重点，已引起了广泛的关注。人们意识到灾后及时地采取应急抢险救援措施，可以有效地减少人员伤亡。灾害应急行动包括建立应急指挥机构，明确职责，并进行资源调配。灾害应急抢险救灾时实性强，其快速反应行动涉及危机管理、预警、撤离、避险，以及维护法律与社会秩序、信息通报、灾情评估。应急救援行动还包括城市基础和生命线的恢复，以确保受灾居民和社区的基本需求。论文在分析城市突发性地质灾害应急管理进展和存在问题的基础上，探讨了当前城市地质灾害应急反应系统中的监测预警系统、快速反应系统、应急指挥系统、应急避难系统、信息发布系统、空间信息系统和宣传教育系统：通过实施这些应急系统并制定预案可以达到减轻城市突发性地质灾害的目的。     

矿井水情监测与水害风险预警平台设计与实现

任何矿井水害事故均会显现不同的预兆,为夯实水害智能预警基础,明晰了感知、辨识、评估、预测及相互逻辑关系的系统建设内涵,针对不同水害类型,根据其突水机理不同,设计三大类多模式水害典型场景,建立相应突水判据,提出了确定性理论精确预测与包括大数据及深度学习在内的非确定性趋势推测两类预测方法,为智能预警系统的预测预报、预警准则及阈值设置奠定理论基础。以陕西省彬长矿区亭南矿为例,建立了动态信息、静态信息及关联信息的指标体系,将地面水文动态监测单元、井下水情环境监测单元以及采掘工作面采动动态监测单元集成,构建原位采集和突水要素预兆感知系统,实施基于关键层电性参数动态监测、关键部位单点或多点多参数监测联合布置的突水前兆信息精准获取方案,采用确定性模拟模型和非确定性智能模型,实现水害预测预警功能,基于多源数据融合和空间联动分析技术,预警系统实现了井上下全空间水害风险预警“一张图”的可视化展示。实践表明,监测预警平台理论基础扎实,预测预警效果显著。