Categories of Hazards and Disasters - Assignment Example

PART B 1. A. What are the four conditions that must be met to have a BLEVE? Liquid must be present Liquid must be in tightly closed container Temperature of confined liquid is above its boiling point at atmospheric pressure There is structural failure of the container B. Explain the TNT-equivalence methods The energy being released during explosion is equated to a mass of TNT in order to provide the equivalent amount of damage. This is demonstrated by the equation: Equivalent mass of TNT= mass of explosives (or fuel) x equivalence factor Where: Equivalence factor = energy ratio factor x efficiency factor Energy ratio factor is the explosion energy per unit mass of explosive (or fuel) compared with the explosion energy in a unit mass of TNT. Efficiency factor on other hand is the proportion of the available combustion energy that is released in the explosion. C. Explosion effects on building structures can be divided into primary and secondary effects, discuss. Can’t find source D. Explain the interaction between a building and explosion blast waves. As a fast chemical reaction, explosion produces transient air pressure waves or blast waves. Blast waves create pressure that will be reflected and refracted by building walls where it is magnified. Since load from blast are transient, the ductility and natural period of vibration of the structure is altered. Ductile elements of the structure such as those made of steel and reinforced concrete will absorb significant energy that can result bending if the blast is so intense. However, brittle materials such as glass, brick, timber, and other are like to fail catastrophically. 2. A. What are the five major categories of hazards associated with terrorism? Chemical Biological Radiological Nuclear Explosive B. Discuss the difference between HAZMAT and CBRN HAZMAT and CBRN is both intended for accidental events or specific acts of terrorism such as Chernobyl, Sarin gas release on the underground system in Tokyo, anthrax release and others. However, HAZMAT is specific to accident involving hazardous material where the chemical involve can be immediately identified and controlled using a contingency plan for that particular chemical and area. In contrast, CBRN incident response is mostly intended for biological or radiological incidents involving biological agents that take longer to take effect than chemicals and can only be identified when symptoms are already present. C. Discuss the two major differences between traditional hazards and the new hazards associated with terrorism Traditional hazards are mostly natural in origin such as hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, earthquake, fires, hazardous materials storage and transportation incidents while new hazards from terrorism are often man-made such as CBRNE or chemical, biological, radiological, and explosive. The major difference is the fact that traditional hazard can now be predicted and responded effectively due to significant knowledge gathered from years of research and actual experience. In contrast, knowledge about new terrorist hazards is limited and mostly under research. Another major difference is the fact that nobody is sure when and in what manner the public will encounter intentional terrorist hazards while traditional hazards are mostly predictable. D. Discuss the milestones in Global Efforts to Control CBRN The milestones in global effort to control CBRN started in 1925 when chemical and biological weapons were prohibited by the Geneva Convention. In 1947, UN Security Council defines WMD or Weapons of Mass Destruction and in 1969, the United States government openly renounced the use of biological weapons. In 1970, the distinction between biological and chemical weapons was recognized by the Committee on Disarmament in Geneva and in 1972, another convention about the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Biological and Toxin Weapons (BWC) and on their Destruction was held. The result of BWC comes into force in 1975 and in the early 1990s; negotiation on a protocol that would strengthen the BWC was proposed and came into force in 1997. Finally, in 2004, the World Health Organisation published its Public Health Response to biological and chemical weapons. 3. A. In the King’s Cross Tube Station Fire in November 1987, Judith Dingley saw the smoking escalator and tried to prevent people going down it: “I stood there with my arms stretched out like Jesus on the cross saying ‘don’t go up there, there is smoke’. But nobody stopped”. Why do you think people did this? This behaviour is commonly attributed to the tendency of some people to underestimate the risk of fire. In fire-related human behaviour, one of the factors that affects human behaviour is fire characteristics and what happened in King Cross Tube Station is similar to Bradford City Stadium fire where a growing fire under the spectators bench was ignored. The warning from Dingley meant nothing to people as just like she said “there is smoke” which in essence is not life-threatening so people out of curiosity and poor risk estimation still went up towards the elevator. B. Discuss the fluid flow phenomenon that was discovered during the investigation into the King Cross underground fire. Initially, investigation of the fire in King Cross underground station reveals that the “fanning effect” of trains approaching and departing accelerated the combustion process and spread flames over the escalator. However, the severity and rapid progression of the fire was only explained later in 1992 as a “trench effect”, the flow of hot gases that pre-heated the wooden escalator and caused the fire to further spread up quicker than normally expected. C. Discuss the decontamination process for a CBRN incident (include drawings) CBRN incident is divided in three zones (hot – only for personnel with PPE, warm for clinical and emergency decontamination, and cold for patient assessment and dispatch. Clearly, majority of decontamination occurs in the warm zone where the following processes are involved. - Removal of contaminated person from the area of greatest contamination - Removal of contaminated clothing - Decontamination (clinical decontamination by Ambulance personnel, emergency and mass decontamination carried out by Fire Service with low-pressure water spray, portable showers, and others). - Clinical assessment and dispatch Decontamination process is shown in drawing below (Note that other process not related to decontamination is excluded) D. Discuss and evaluate the disaster life cycle and the UK and Global disaster and emergency management plans along with the differences between dealing with disasters and catastrophes. Disaster life cycle starts with mitigation then followed by preparedness, response, and recovery. Mitigation and preparedness are made in anticipation of a disaster but their success depends on the availability of resources and information about hazards, risks, and appropriate countermeasures. In response, attempts are made to minimise the hazards created by a particular disaster but temporary and limited to the basic needs of the victims. Recovery on the other hand is an attempt to return normal community life but there is no distinct point or guarantee when temporary relief changes into recovery or long-term sustainable development. The UK emergency management plan is based the scale or complexity of the problem and in the medallion based command and control, the fire and rescue, police, and health authorities are first responders. Compared with its global counterpart, UK emergency management plan is based on resilience where local authorities must deal with emergencies on their level. This is a bit different to global approach where coordination of all relevant stakeholders is sought. In the UK command and control for instance, the Silver and Gold command structure are only established when the incident escalate into a level requiring more resources. 4. A. Difference between accidents and catastrophes Both can happen unexpectedly and unintentionally but damage and suffering from catastrophe is far greater than accident. Catastrophe is a complete failure and numerically, the number of casualties in accident is around 1 to 1,000 people while more than 1 million for catastrophe. B. Discuss the myths associated with human behaviour in fires. Panic and altruistic behaviour are myths of human behaviour in fires. This is because the reactive impulse shown by people in fire incidents is not necessarily panic and altruistic behaviour but strong anxiety that is more associated with human emotion than actions resulting to aggressive, maladaptive, and irrational behaviour. C. What is the role of the media in providing misrepresentations about disaster behaviour? Media reports are often dramatic, sensational, and seem more interested in tragic and extraordinary events. For instance, the media misrepresented the socio-behavioural response of the people of New Orleans during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina when it reported that looting, panic, and abandonment were widespread across New Orleans. Media create misconceptions by misrepresenting facts and exaggerating about the impact of disaster. D. What occupant characteristics will affect their behaviour fire situations? Physical and cognitive limitations of individual can affect the behaviour of building occupants as limited mobility can result to anxiety and irrational behaviour particularly in the face of danger. 5. A. What are the four phases or functional areas of emergency management? Mitigation Preparedness Response Recovery B. Discuss the major categories of hazards. Provide examples. The major categories of hazards include environment hazards such earthquakes, floods, landslide, tornadoes, epidemic disease, wildfires, and so on. The other is terrorism hazards that include biological, chemical, explosive, and others, For example, Hurrican Katrina is an environmental hazard while sarin attack, a package of poisonous gas released in a Tokyo subway in 1995 is terrorism hazard. C. Why is damage assessment important and what methods are used to conduct damage assessments? Damage assessment can help estimate total losses for reporting and policy-making purposes. It can also contribute to the development and rehabilitation of affected areas. Traditionally, damage assessments in the UK are carried out by specialized personnel deployed to the field but recently post-satellite imagery is used to provide damage assessment and other phases of disaster recovery. D. Different types of disaster produce different types of debris? Can you provide examples that support statement? Why is it important to know this? It is important to understand debris generated by disasters as this is part of waste management. For instance, floods can generate tons of debris such as trees and shrubs, personal property, garbage, dirt, and others. In contrast, volcanic eruptions can generate enormous amount of ashes, dust, and so on. Debris generated by Hurricane Katrina include significant volume of materials containing hazardous asbestos from damaged buildings. Read More