Showing papers on "Natural disaster published in 1978"

The environment as hazard

Abstract: The Environment as Hazard offers an understanding of how people around the world deal with dramatic fluctuations in the local natural systems of air, water, and terrain. Reviewing recent theoretical and methodological changes in the investigation of natural hazards, the authors describe how research findings are being incorporated into public policy, particularly research on slow cumulative events, technological hazards, the role played by social systems, and the relation of hazards theory to risk analysis. Through vivid examples from a broad sample of countries, this volume illuminates the range of experiences associated with natural hazards. The authors show how modes of coping change with levels of economic development by contrasting hazards in developing countries with those in high income countries - comparing the results of hurricanes in Bangladesh and the United States, and earthquakes in Nicaragua and California. In new introductory and concluding chapters that supplement the original text, the authors present new global data sets, as well as a trenchant discussion of implications of hazards research for the International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction and for attempts by the world community to come to grips with the threats of climate change.

Studies in geophysics: Geophysical predictions: Overview and recommendations

Abstract: The good earth not only sustains life; it is also the greatest killer. In some years the earth's paroxysms kill hundreds of thousands of people. For example, an earthquake in northern China on July 28, 1976, leveled the city of Tangshan. It killed more than 600,000 persons and injured an additional 700,000 [Associated Press, 1977]. We can only view with awe this and other natural catastrophes. Even though the toll may not be as high as in the Tangshan earthquake, death and destruction are common. Each year brings its own share of these natural disasters. Volcanic eruptions, hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, and tsunamis (water surges produced by submarine earthquakes) all kill, maim, and destroy. In most instances, timely warnings can and will reduce loss of life, but they seldom avert the destruction of property. A good example in recent memory is the havoc wrought by hurricane Agnes and its accompanying flash floods. In four days in June 1972 it killed 118 people and caused $3.5 billion in property damages, a record for losses of private and public property and facilities.