Emergency and Disaster Management - Term Paper Example

Disasters and Emergency Name & ID Course Name & ID Instructor’s Name Date Table of Contents Disasters and Emergency 1 Table of Contents 2 1.0 Introduction 3 2.0 Nature of Accidents and Catastrophes 3 3.0 Classification of Accidents and Catastrophes 4 3.1 Man Made Disaster 4 3.2 Natural Disaster 5 4.0 Factors Contributing to Accidents/ Disasters 5 5.0 Modern day Threats & frequencies 6 6.0 Disaster Lifecycle 7 7.0 UK Disaster Management 9 7.1 Disaster Management Plan 9 7.2 Legislation 9 7.3 Reconstruction Strategy 10 8.0 Difference between Disaster & Catastrophe 11 9.0 Glossary 11 10.0 Conclusion 11 11.0 Reference 13 1.0 Introduction In the current world situation, accidents and catastrophes are common phenomena. Million worth of properties, many people die, and inconveniences to the society and economy are affecting the way that people should behave. These numerous accidents and catastrophes results in economic, social and environmental losses and it impacts many people and geographic locations. Different countries develop strategies and measures to mitigate complications associated with disasters. Type of disasters and catastrophes differ but all aimed at disrupting the way people operate, disrupts fulfilment of daily duties and causes inconveniences that are devastating. Thus, the aim of this report is to analyse accidents and catastrophes, factors that interact to cause the accident, modern day threats, disaster lifecycle, UK Disaster Management and illustrating the difference between disaster and catastrophes. 2.0 Nature of Accidents and Catastrophes A catastrophe or accident can be defined as causes that result in negative effects to the society, economy and environment. Thus, catastrophes and accidents occur because of inappropriate risk management measures. The definition of a risk in the case of this report is a product that results because of a hazard and vulnerability. Nevertheless, the type of hazard differs based on the locality and size of population (Moodie 1992). For example, a hazard that occurs in an area of low vulnerability may not be seen as a catastrophe; an example of low vulnerability area is uninhabited region or a desert. This means that the impact of a catastrophe may differ between and within countries. For example, in the developing nations catastrophes are more devastating than industrialised or developed countries. Generally, a catastrophe or disaster can be classified using the nature or origin of the accident. Classification of catastrophes is based on the causative agents, which are natural and human made. 3.0 Classification of Accidents and Catastrophes The causative agents are used to classify the type of disaster that occurs. Generally, the two major catastrophes are man-made and natural disasters. 3.1 Man Made Disaster This type of accident is associated with activities of man or human inability and may result because of human intent, negligence, an error or a failure of a system. This means that man made disasters are those that occur because of human hazards without putting in place adequate emergency management measures. Moreover, man made disasters can further be divided into two parts, which are technological and sociological disasters (Allyn, 1993). Sociological disasters are associated with human negative behaviours towards other people, organisations or ideologies. Examples of sociological disasters are civil disorder, terrorism, war and crime. An actual example of sociological disaster is the 9/11 bomb attack in United States of America. On the other hand, technological disasters are associated with advancement of human needs and development or equipments and accessories that fulfil their personal and societal needs. Some examples of technological disasters are industrial hazards, structural collapse, hazardous materials and transportation. An example of technological disaster that has occurred is the Chernobyl Nuclear Explosion in 1986 (Greenberg, 2006). 3.2 Natural Disaster Natural disaster has no relation with humans but occurs naturally and sometimes adversely affects human activities. Extent of the damage or impacts to human vulnerability results because of inappropriate emergency management and may lead to economic, human (social) and environmental losses. The extent of damage associated with natural calamity will be determined by the capability and determination of population to resist and manage the disaster (Arnold, 2000). Thus, a natural hazard at times may not be caused by natural agent but may result because of vulnerability of the inhabitants. Nevertheless, like man made disaster, natural disaster may be classified to what causes it. Land movement is a natural disaster that is caused by the way the soil or earth moves on earth e.g. volcanic eruptions or earthquakes. Water disasters are caused by enormous amounts of water entering human population locations through such issues as tsunamis, floods and limbic eruptions. Moreover, weather disasters are caused by heat waves, cyclonic storms, blizzards and droughts. Other natural disasters may result due to fires and space e.g. solar flare and usually results in solar system and diseases (Sharer, 2005). 4.0 Factors Contributing to Accidents/ Disasters Accidents are usually caused by negligence or inappropriate following of the required procedures. Man made disasters are common because of psychological or sociological factors. For example, the terrorists attack and disasters are associated with sociological backgrounds that do not reflect the position of current culture or aspirations (Palmer, 2006). Moreover, in the case of industrial hazards, errors and faults usually results in devastating effects both to the environment, society and economy and sometimes the environmental consequence may go beyond the country that the accident occurred such as the incident of Chernobyl disaster and may be felt many afters after the accident. Poor emergency planning and not following conclusively the directions and rules that have been formulated may increase the impact of the disaster (Reid, 2000). Contingency plans are formulated so that they can be implemented during times of accidents and disasters, but some officials and stakeholders who are supposed to ensure that civil community is safe may not fully follow the requirements of contingency plan. Thus, ineffective and inefficiency of the employees and other workers who are supposed to follow the requirements in place contributes towards the disaster. 5.0 Modern day Threats & frequencies Modern day threats are associated with industrialisation and sociological factors. For example, terrorism attack is a sociological generated incident that results in people targeting other people believed to be against their ideological for philosophical views (Bramble, 2006). Terrorism disasters are growing at a faster rate in that frequently there are news briefs and information that illustrates terrorism disasters has occurred. Terrorism attacks have occurred in different countries such as London, Spain and United States of America. Another modern day is disasters that are caused my industrialisation and are usually associated with negligence or errors in the side of systems operators (Cockell, 2003). Even though emergency measures are in place, there are situations that the contingency plan cannot fulfil its requirements and thus industrial accidents usually occur. 6.0 Disaster Lifecycle Disaster lifecycle is the steps that emergency is management. The cycle of disaster management should follow a given phase that brings into consideration that includes long-term work on infrastructure, human justice issues and public awareness (Folmer, 1998). Emergency management usually brings into consideration four phases/stages, which are preparedness, mitigation, recovery and response. The aims of mitigation are to prevent hazards from occurring, or to reduce effects of disasters if they occur. The main difference between mitigation and other phases is that it focuses on long-term measures for eliminating or reducing risk. Mitigation can be employed after disaster through the recovery period ensuring that the recovery process is accelerated. Mitigation employs different strategies such as technological solutions such as flood levees while other measures may include legislation, insurance and land-use planning (Allred, Addams and Chakraborty, 2007). Even though the phase is cost efficient method, there is no clear way for providing regulations regarding communication of risks to the public, sanctions against those who refuse to obey rules and evacuation. Other strategies that can be used to improve the position of mitigation process are physical risk assessment and catastrophe modelling. The second phase is preparedness in which the emergency managers develop plans to utilise when disasters strikes. Some measures that are included in preparedness appropriate communication that brings into consideration methods and terminology, maintain and training equipment and services, emergency population warning, stocking the appropriate equipments and products and developing trained volunteers among the civilian community (Baker, 2006). Some of these organisations that should be included in disaster preparedness are Red Cross and Regional Contingencies Committees. Another important area that should be placed into consideration is determination the percentage of casualty through prediction. Generally, the managers within this level should be flexible and encompassing through provision of typical means of support. Moreover, it is important to ensure all stakeholders are incorporated in disaster management planning providing and allocating each sector with specific roles and responsibilities. When the accident occurs, it is the time of response team to ensure that the accident is addressed. This calls upon different strategies such as allocation of appropriate resources and mobilising of first responders in the disaster area. These include introducing emergency services like police, fire-fighters and ambulance crews. Thus, during preparedness of emergency strategies, it is important to include efficient coordination of rescue. In this case, Incident Command System (ICS) and most of these principles are supported by Mutual Aid (MA) and Unified Command (UC) (Bramble, 2006). The fourth and last stage is recovery phase in which restoration of affected area to its previous stage. This effort usually takes place after the incident in which the immediate needs are addressed and the main goals associated with recovery efforts are re-employment, rebuilding destroyed property and repair of infrastructure that was destroyed. 7.0 UK Disaster Management 7.1 Disaster Management Plan Emergency management is an approach that deals with avoiding and reducing risks that are associated with disasters. Moreover, the disaster management plan involves means counters catastrophes and the way the location and people lives will be rebuilt (Bramble, 2006). This means that there are steps that should be followed while ensuring that loopholes that are evident in emergency control are mitigated. The major stages that are followed by UK disaster management are anticipation, assessment, response, prevention, recovery and preparation. Mitigation in accident may mean reducing the level of hazard and prevent it from reaching catastrophic level. This is a process that ensures measures that put in place to reduce or eliminate risks and other times may result in developing strategies that will manage future risks. The management plan will thus result in the formulation and implementation of any measures that will result in future prevention of such catastrophes. 7.2 Legislation The government of United Kingdom has formulated and implemented various legislations that guides the way catastrophes and disasters can be managed and the steps that should be followed in controlling it. Moreover, the government has involved different stakeholders into developing a framework that is used to mitigate the risks and hazards. Numerous organisations and legislatives have been formed to ensure that threats and risks are controlled (Bramwell, 1997). An example of organisation that has been developed to mitigate disaster problems is the Civil Contingencies Secretariat that was created in 2001. This organisation is managed by Cabinet Office that is responsible for emergency planning. The main of aim of this organisation is to ensure that UK should be resilient against disruptive challenges and collaborate with other stakeholders in ways of planning, maintaining and resolving the disaster. This Secretariat is divided into three parts, which are Policy, Operations and Assessment (Davids and Newcomb, 2006). Moreover, the British government passed an Act of Parliament providing enormous powers during an emergency. In 2004, the Civil Contingencies Act was passed that replaced the 20th century Civil Defence and Emergency Powers. The Civil Contingencies Act 2004 is split into three parts that are further categorised into two responders. These three parts are Local Arrangements for Civil Protection, Emergency powers while the last category provides legislation that is used to support the first two categories. Additionally, Category 1 and Category 2 responders provides or specifies organisations that are defined in the Civil Contingencies Act of 2004 that has responsibilities that carries out laid down legislation (Davids and Newcomb, 2006). Another important organisation is Institute of Emergency Management (IEM) 2006 was dedicated in ensuring that professionals and managers from different fields of emergency in researching ways that will be used to resolve and improve major incidents and develop long term coordination of management strategies. 7.3 Reconstruction Strategy Reconstruction strategy provides a holistic approach through collaborations with other bodies in matters that are related to recovery and reconstruction (Halley, 1999). Recovery process provides a framework that supports community sustainability through capacity building that will contribute towards reducing future risks into a level that is manageable. Some of the important stakeholders that are involved in reconstruction strategies are the lifeline agencies, construction and reinstatement organisations, insurance companies, assets owners and non-governmental agencies. To achieve these requirements of reconstruction, the government has developed stages that include assessment, funding arrangements, restoration proposal, physical construction and regulatory process. 8.0 Difference between Disaster & Catastrophe Disaster and catastrophe shares to some extent the same meaning, however, there difference exists because of severity of the accident. In the case of a disaster, a calamitous event especially that occurs suddenly causing great damage, loss of life or hardship such as business failure, airplane crash and flooding. On the other hand, catastrophe is a sudden and widespread disaster and affects a large population resulting in enormous economic, social and environmental severity (Hawthorne, 2003). 9.0 Glossary Disaster – it is an accident that occurs suddenly and affects a small population Catastrophe- it is a large disaster Recovery – restoring accident or disaster location to its previous position 10.0 Conclusion Accidents are inherent and any task that people are associated with is likely to suffer an injury. However, the extent of the injury is determined by its severity. Accidents result in extensive destruction of economic, social and environmental provisions. Disasters may be categorically grouped as either man made or natural. Man made disasters are those that are caused by human activities while natural disasters has not influence of human. Example of man made disaster is technological accident and terrorism while natural disaster is flooding or earthquakes. Numerous factors interact that causes disasters, which may include negligence in the side of humans while natural may also be caused by human activities such as destruction of environment. Some of modern day disasters are terrorism and those that are associated with industrial errors. Disaster lifecycle generally follows four phases, which are mitigation, preparedness, recovery and restoration. Each phase factors into consideration specific requirements that should be played with specific members of the community and government. In the case of UK disaster management, important phases include formulation of management, legislation and reconstruction strategies. The most common difference that exists between disaster and catastrophe is the extent of severity. 11.0 Reference Allred, A., Addams, H.L., and Chakraborty, G. 2007. ‘Is informal planning the key to success of Disaster Management?’ Journal of Small Business Strategy, Vol. 18, Iss. 1, pp. 95-104. Allyn, L. 1993. Man-Made Catastrophes: From the Burning of Rome to the Lockerbie Crash. New York: Prentice Hall. Arnold, M. 2000. Managing Disaster Risk in Emerging Economies. London: Cambridge University Press. Baker, F. 2006. Introduction to Disasters: Categories. New York: O’Reilly Publishers. Bramble, T 2006 ‘Understanding Chernobyl Accident and Other Accidents’, Journal of Sociology, Sep., vol. 42. pp. 287 – 309 Bramwell, B. 1997. Containment of Disasters. Jakarta: Prentice Hall of Jakarta Cockell, C. 2003. Common Cause of Catastrophes/Disasters, Accidents. New York: Cambridge University Press. Davids, M., and Newcomb, K. 2006. ‘Examples of Disasters and Impacts to Population, Vol. 21, Iss. 4, pp. 22-25. Folmer, M. 1998. Consequences of Climate Change. London: Longman Publishers. Halley, N. 1999. Disasters. New York: McGraw Hill Publishers. Hawthorne, F. 2003. Analysis of EU Disasters and Policies. New York: New York Publishers. Greenberg, M. 2006. Disaster: A Compendium of Terrorist, Natural and Man-Made Catastrophes. New York: McGraw-Hill Publishers. Sharer, L. 2005. Consequences of Catastrophes. Jakarta: Prentice Hall of Jakarta. Reid, B. 2000. Natural and Man Made Disasters. Singapore: Prentice Hall Publishers. Moodie, K. 1992. The King’s Cross Fire: Damage Assessment and Overview of the Technical Investigation. Fire Safety Journal, 18, pp. 13 – 33. Palmer, T. 2006. Analysis of Tsunami. New York: Oxford University Press. Read More