Precautions against disasters

Abstract

A catastrophe is a natural occurrence, a technical disaster, a terrorist attack, or some similar event which affects a large number of people or a large region, with the result that standard emergency measures fail to provide everyone with the required assistance in time. Recent examples include the Elbe River floods of 2002, the East Asian tsunami of 2004, earthquakes in Pakistan, forest fires in Portugal, and most recently hurricanes in the Caribbean in 2008, all of which caused devastating damage. The dimensions of these natural disasters have noticeably increased, not least due to our higher vulnerability compared with previous decades. At present it is usually not possible to predict when and where they will occur, and how severe they will be. But the damage they cause can be reduced by taking better precautions and optimising our ability to respond to disasters.