From Entrepreneur.com — Can Your Organization Survive a Natural Disaster; an Infogram re Business Preparedness for Disasters. You can browse it online or printed it off as a poster, in 6 pages. Apparently the source is Boston University’s School of Management.
This makes a nice companion to the infographic on business continuity that I cited last fall.
Time and time again we see risky areas that have buildings on them that are later deemed questionable. Why does that happen? See this article in the NYT: No Easy Way to Restrict Construction in Risky Areas. From the intro:
After disasters like the Oso landslide in Washington State, a common question is why people are allowed to live in such dangerous places. On the website of Scientific American, for example, the blogger Dana Hunter wrote, “It infuriates me when officials know an area is unsafe, and allow people to build there anyway.”
But things are rarely simple when government power meets property rights. The government has broad authority to regulate safety in decisions about where and how to build, but it can count on trouble when it tries to restrict the right to build. “Often, it ends up in court,” said Lynn Highland, a geographer with the United States Geological Survey’s landslide program in Golden, Colo.
I got this citation from a posting on the topic by Phil Palin in the blog Homeland Security Watch.
Two recent reports have been critical of the readiness of Canada for major natural disasters. See this article re Canada not prepared for natural disasters, say top insurance execs – according to the article:
Canada is doing little to anticipate risks of extreme weather and this inaction will cost us severely when disaster eventually strikes, said Canadian insurance executives during the Globe conference on environmental business and sustainability held in Vancouver.
Mary Lou O’Reilly, senior vice president of issues management and communications with Insurance Bureau of Canada called for action to prepare for the coming storms in Canada.
“For a long time we lived impervious to severe weather but the fact of the matter is that the story has changed,” said O’Reilly, noting last summer’s devastating floods in Alberta and ice storms crippling Toronto this winter.
Another recent report, by the auditor in British Columbia, was critical of the province’s Catastrophic Earthquake Preparedness. Direct URL for that report (44 pp) is here.
It is not often that you see a detailed and candid account of the failings of the response effort to an earthquake. Sadly, the death toll and the law suits that followed the Feb. 2011 earthquake and aftershocks in Christchurch led to this inquiry. The final report was recently released.
Thanks to Ian McLean and John Coleman for the links.
From the AP, this article about a new UN report: UN Report: Global Warming Worsens Security Woes
In an authoritative report due out Monday a United Nations climate panel for the first time is connecting hotter global temperatures to hotter global tempers. Top scientists are saying that climate change will complicate and worsen existing global security problems, such as civil wars, strife between nations and refugees.
They’re not saying it will cause violence, but will be an added factor making things even more dangerous. Fights over resources, like water and energy, hunger and extreme weather will all go into the mix to destabilize the world a bit more, says the report by the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The main UN site for press info and the full report on Monday the 31st is here. Regarding the scientific base of the report, note this quote:
The report is based on more than 12,000 peer reviewed scientific studies. Michel Jarraud, secretary general of the World Meteorological Organization, a co-sponsor of the climate panel, said this report was “the most solid evidence you can get in any scientific discipline.”
Article from the Wash. Post on March 31; U.N. climate panel: Governments, businesses need to take action now against growing risks
Global warming is hurting the poor and may lead to more civil wars and amplified economic shocks as its effects grow more severe, a U.N. group says.
Update: Once again, we see an example of the gap between knowledge known by at least the scientific community about a hazard and the working knowledge of the current public officials. We saw that gap during Hurricane Katrina and we saw it again with Hurricane Sandy, to name just a couple of recent examples.
Apparently, there were several studies and several precedents for landslides in the area of Oso Washington. The articles below go from oldest to newest:
(1) From the National Geographic: Mudslides Explained: Behind the Washington State Disaster. It begins:
A fatal mudslide in rural northwestern Washington State over the weekend underscores the dangers of this fast-moving natural hazard. On Saturday morning, a mudslide moved down the Stillaguamish River near the small former fishing village of Oso, Washington. Authorities have confirmed eight dead, eight injured, and as many as 108 people missing or unaccounted for as of Monday morning. The one-square-mile (2.6-square-kilometer) track of the mudslide also destroyed about 30 homes.
(2) From the Christian Science Monitor: Can mudslides be predicted? Washington site’s history highlights challenge. (+video)
Eight people died in the Washington mudslide, and the toll is expected to rise. No detailed hazard map exists for the country as a whole, and no national database exists of past slides and the conditions that caused them.
(3) From the Washington Post, March 30 : Before the Landslides; Warnings about the Unthinkable. One quote: ” It was a nightmare waiting to happen.”
(4) April 5, Christian Science Monitor: Authorities Knew of Mudslide Danger But Didn’t Tell Residents.
From Business Insider, an article titled : The 10 Cities Most At Risk Of Being Hit By Natural Disasters . I cannot vouch for their selection methodology, but the results are interesting to consider. Only one U.S. city is on this list and that is Los Angeles.
Update: An eeire coincidence that on March 29, LA experiences a 5.1 magnitude earthquake and more than 100 aftershocks. Damaged to small number of residential structures have been documented. See this account from the LA Times.
A recent study of older adults by the Univ. of Iowa produced this report: Older adults in U.S. not prepared for natural disasters; Older adults often have special needs that increase their vulnerabilty
Guest Posting by Sasha Azar, Research Assistant and Master’s Candidate, Georgetown University
A number of researchers, including the Recovery Diva, have stated that recovery (especially long-term recovery) is the least understood and studied aspect of emergency management. More extensive basic and applied research is needed in this area in order to better address the anticipated growth in size and frequency of future disasters.
Although there is a critical need for more data on recovery overall, one particular subset of recovery remains severely underdeveloped. Business recovery is a key element of community recovery efforts, yet very little knowledge based on research is available on the topic. The resources available regarding business recovery are largely sparse, sporadic, and often elementary in nature. On the other hand, a plethora of resources are available regarding business recovery’s sexier sister, business continuity, which is an entirely different concept that focuses mostly on IT. The disconnect that exists between the amounts of information available on the two topics further exemplifies how little is really understood about recovery.
Unlike my earlier posting on this blog on Are You New to Recovery Research, very few, if any, online resources exist that emphasize business recovery. Two good and recent examples are Planning for Post-Disaster Recovery: A Review of the United States Disaster Assistance Framework, a textbook by Gavin Smith, and Disaster Recovery by Brenda Phillips are good general print resources regarding this topic. In addition to textbooks, a few journals have published articles specific to business recovery. Some of the better articles are listed and described below:
Businesses and Disasters: Empirical Patterns and Unanswered Questions, a study by G. Webb, K. Tierney, and J. Dahlhamer (1999), was one of the first to thoroughly explore the topic of business recovery through qualitative research. The Disaster Research Center (DRC) at the University of Delaware collected data from 5,000 private-sector firms across the country. The study revealed a number of interesting findings, including which factors influence and affect the ability of businesses to recover following major disaster events.
Organizations at Risk: What Happens When Small Businesses and Not-for-Profits Encounter Natural Disasters, a robust report by D. Alesch, J. Holly, E. Mittler, and R. Nagy (2001) published by the Public Entity Risk Institute (PERI), delved into the particular challenges small businesses and not-for-profits face following a disaster. A separate set of recovery obstacles exists for these smaller firms that are altogether not present for larger firms, and this report aimed to expose those obstacles and provide recommendations for improvement based on the results of the analysis.
Building Community Resiliency: Spatial Links between Household and Business Post-Disaster Return, a report by Yu Xiao and Shannon Van Zandt (2011), explored the interdependency of households’ and businesses’ ability to recover following a disaster. The return of households and businesses to a community is mutually dependent, as the reopening of businesses can influence nearby households’ decisions to return to the community just as the return of households to the area will increase the chances that a business will return as well.
Two provide analyses of business recovery actions following a number of major disasters in an effort to better understand private-sector recovery practices and suggest areas for improvement.
Predicting Long-Term Business Recovery from Disaster: A Comparison of the Loma Prieta Earthquake and Hurricane Andrew, also by G. Webb, K. Tierney, and J. Dahlhamer (2002), found that a number of factors, such as the economic sector in which a business operates and the scope of its primary market, can be used to predict future success of business recovery efforts. Predictability is an important function of emergency management, and this report’s findings—though published over a decade ago—still provide useful information for today’s professionals in the field.
New Orleans Business Recovery in the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, an analysis by J. LeSage, R. Pace, N. Lam, R. Campanella, and X. Liu (2010), considered the decision-making processes used by businesses in the affected area to evaluate whether to reopen, relocate, or close indefinitely and the factors that influenced such decisions. The outcome of the analysis highlighted several important implications for how business recovery analyses should be conducted in the future, and even how government aid programs are likely to be affected by these findings.
The above reports, articles, and analyses provide a good general introduction to the complexities of business recovery, but much more empirical data is needed for professionals in the field to find the information reliable.
ADDENDA:
See also the site for Rothstein Associates – It’s hard to characterize this site: it provides resources for businesses after a disaster and maintains a bookstore with products that cover recovery practices and training for business recovery.
Restore YourEconomy.org; Disaster Preparedness and Economic Recovery
Sponsored by the U.S. Economic Development Agency and the International Economic Development Council
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Thanks to Pierre Picard for his review of this posting. We welcome additional suggestions and comments.
Scientists to climate change skeptics: Get real
Much of the extreme weather that wreaked havoc in Asia, Europe and the Pacific region last year can be blamed on human-induced climate change, according to the World Meteorological Organization.
The U.N. weather agency’s annual assessment Monday said 2013 was the sixth-warmest year on record. Thirteen of the 14 warmest years have occurred in the 21st century.
Rising sea levels has led to increasing damage from storm surges and coastal flooding, as demonstrated by Typhoon Haiyan, the agency’s Secretary-General Michel Jarraud said. The typhoon in November killed at least 6,100 people and caused $13 billion in damage to the Philippines and Vietnam.
Australia, meanwhile, had its hottest year on record.“Many of the extreme events of 2013 were consistent with what we would expect as a result of human-induced climate change,” Jarraud said.
As of March 28th, more new studies on climate change.
Recovery Diva 
