Weed Leaf Nail Design

The method of scenarios in planning and emergency management

Estratto dal libro: Principles of Emergency Planning and Management David Alexander

In the context of disasters, a scenario is a hypothetical progression of circumstances and events designed to illustrate or reveal the consequences of any decision, action or impact. Usually the scenario is set up to provide a consistent and logical answer to the question "what if ...?" However, rather than aim for the future, sometimes using the method of scenarios to look back (a positive and constructive way to use hindsight) as a tool for debriefing to better learn the lessons of an event's happened before.

A scenario is a model of conditions and circumstances. It is usually designed to reveal the link between these two things (that is, how the conditions affect the circumstances and conditions as circumstances change). The method of the scenarios can be used, for example, to reveal the consequences of the impacts of disasters, or a certain range of mitigation works, or certain strategies of search and rescue of survivors. The scenarios may explain the vulnerability interacts with dangerousness to create special forms of risk and impact. The scenarios for losses due to disasters can be modified according to certain measures to reduce the risk and in relation to how they work during the disaster.

It is clearly essential to build the scenarios as chains of events that are plausible and reliable. One of best ways to do this is to use a systems approach (systems approach). The entries are specified in the form of a series of conditions and forces that cause changes in fundamental variables (such as a river flood wave interacts with the strength of a bank). Further conditions are specified within the compass of the system: some of these limitations, and other guides, the mechanisms of change in the situation as it evolves. Together, the conditions act as a forcing function, or motive of the events. The emission model is the scenario, as constructed, and its changes over time taken into account.

The scenarios are useful to contingency planning, given that the method can be used to clarify the conditions that need a plan (ie, the presence of dangerous phenomena and their likely effects), that the impact of preparation in terms of how it can reduce risk. In fact, detailed studies of hazard, vulnerability and risk exposure can be integrated into the development of the scenarios that are created to investigate the losses and injuries in disasters. As a result, they may form the basis of emergency planning and measures to mitigate the risk.

The first step in building a scenario is to specify the initial entries and the limitations (Boundary conditions). For example, you could develop a scenario for a magnitude 7 earthquake, which constitutes the danger of fires dl emission scenario and soul. The initial conditions are given the vulnerability of the built heritage, dall'inquadramento activity at the time of the earthquake, people living in the area at risk, and the ability of the emergency forces to respond quickly to disaster. The development scenario is based on the temporal progression of events. The vulnerability data indicate that a number of houses could collapse and a number of people could die. Under this scenario can be used to judge the probabile efficacia delle operazione di soccorso o per stimare la riduzione dei danni e degli infortuni avuta con un potenziamento dell'intervento immediatamente dopo il sisma.

Lo scenario procede attraverso una serie di fasi, le quali vengono solitamente definite dagli eventi (ad esempio, può estendersi dall'isolamento delle vittime all'inizio dell'emergenza all'arrivo delle forze incaricate con la ricerca e il salvataggio dei superstiti, e poi all'inizio dei processi di ripristino). Alla fine di ogni fase si può "congelare il tempo" e trarre la somma degli eventi successi, delle azioni e le decisioni prese. Così si ottiene una "sezione trasversale" del disastro, un quadro del progresso fatto e dei problemi affrontati dai principali actors (disaster managers, relief workers, firefighters, volunteers, doctors, paramedics, etc.).. When you explicate the entire progression of events, and was once the final outcome, you can change the scenario by searching for answers to a series of questions like "what happens if we double the number of rescuers?" or "what will happen if the earthquake caused landslides that hinder the main roads into the disaster area?" The answers to these questions are based on a number of changes to the outcomes of the scenario.

is particularly important that the emergency planning construct scenarios in written form, if necessary with the help of relevant experts, for all major risks and dangers that come within its competence. These will serve to illustrate the situations that must be planned and will help to establish the parameters of the process of emergency planning at the local level.

In many cases the construction of scenarios a priori there are no means to verify the result, if a disaster does not happen like that in the near future (thus making the scenario a kind of prophecy!). So we look for the verisimilitudine the plausibility of the facts, conditions, mechanisms and outcomes represented by the scenario. While going on the progression of events must continually ask themselves: is this possible? " or: "Is likely to happen this way?" It is best to avoid scenarios or improbable events, and also, of course, the injury, the excesses of fantasy, irrationality, excessive detail. A good scenario writing takes the reader with clarity, transparency and logic through a series of events will demonstrate the framework for decisions, illuminate the reasons for actions taken, describe the outcomes, and justify the different events with a credible and logical explanation . The present exemplary scenario the large picture of the situation and not be encumbered by the invention of large amounts of detail. Its bases are collected data on hazards and risks, and also the trend di eventi simili che sono veramente accaduti in passato (quindi è essenziale studiare meticolosamente i dati che possono aiutare la formulazione dello scenario). Così, l'esito finale sarà interamente plausibile, sebbene non necessariamente immune al dibattito.

Come esempio consideriamo lo scenario costruito per una ripetizione del grande terremoto di Kanto, che avvenne in Giappone nel 1923, il quale è raccapricciante. Si aspetta tra 40.000 e 60.000 morti, fino a US$1.200 miliardi di danni al patrimonio edilizio, danni per $900 miliardi all'infrastruttura, e perdite di $1.000 miliardi dovute all'interruzione delle attività redditizie. Comunque, il vero esito dipende dalle assunzioni su cui è basato questo scenario: some researchers have considered exaggerated sums of money found here. However, it is clear that many important things are at stake: the final figure of losses could be equivalent to half of GDP and Japanese financial markets may force the world to suffer a serious downturn.

Of course, most of the scenarios are less grand than this, and so now we will consider a hypothetical example that has the merit of being very simple. To be brief, to exclude most of the details of the fund.

Around 16.00 a normal Friday afternoon in a case of May an earthquake measuring 6.7. The strong shaking lasts 33 seconds and generates horizontal accelerations the surface reaching 31% of gravity (0.31 g). Among the architectural heritage of the city hardest hit (50,000 inhabitants) the damage is serious but not universal. Most spectacular of all, a 200 m long section of a highway viaduct collapsed on a parking machine, crushing several cars and maybe some of their occupants. Secondly, the facade of brick and concrete of a department store in the mall of the city collapsed and blocked the main road with its rubble. Again, as there may be victims. In third place in a shed, in use at the time of the quake, with a steel frame collapsed in the industrial zone, while in the residential you had the partial collapse of a 4-story building occupied by the elderly. In three points of the city breaking gas pipes has resulted in fires that are violent but fortunately located. Elsewhere in the rupture of water pipes has led to a series of small floods and a severe loss of pressure of water supply in the city. The lack of mutual assistance indicates that neighboring communities have to deal with serious damage. Finally, in the area there is only one hospital with emergency room, and its functionality and efficiency are limited by severe structural damage and the absence of several members of the medical and support of some officials.

The scenario goes on the basis of a rational approach managing a situation that is currently full of unknown, uncertainties and limits on the capacity to act. The damage described above is clearly based on appraisals of vulnerability that are made in "times of peace" in mind with a certain magnitude of earthquakes and other seismic parameters of the specification. The description refers to a time point about half an hour after the earthquake: it is not complete at this time because you will not have a complete range of information on the disaster. For example, the number of deaths and injuries is not known. The further development of scenario depends on a number of assumptions of how it will continue the rescue operation, and shows how the situation than people who remain homeless and injured survivors and trapped. The end result is a graphic of the immediate need for massive resources, a problem that the planner will face a very serious emergency.

Pain In Tummy With A Feeling Of Bowel Movement

A quartet of disasters

I wrote these four essays in the mid-90s for an encyclopedia published in America in the twentieth century. I offer the translation of the English text as an example of the methodology for the analysis of catastrophic events, practiced with the aim to draw conclusions for the future.

EARTHQUAKE IN ARMENIA

brief summary. About 25,000 people have died in an earthquake of magnitude 6.9 that caused the collapse of many buildings in three jerry-built towns and 150 villages in northern Armenia. The event

. The main shock occurred at 11.41 on 7 December 1988, about 80 km south of the main chain of the Caucasus. The shaking lasted 30 seconds and reached 21% gravitational accelerator. Four minutes later came a aftershocks of magnitude 5.9, which caused further collapse of the buildings already damaged by the first knocked.

Officially, 24,944 people died, although some estimates were much higher. Of the 31,000 wounded, the hospital had 12,200.

Circa il 40% del territorio armeno fu interessato dal terremoto, e, dei 150 paesi danneggiati, 58 villaggi furono quasi interamente distrutti e 3 città furono gravemente danneggiate: Leninakan (pop. 290.000), Spitak (pop. 20.000) e Kirovakan (pop. non conosciuta). Ben 8 milioni di metri quadri degli alloggi (il 17% del totale armeno) furono distrutti o resi inagibili. Soltanto a Leninakan, 72 edifici alti sono crollati e 60 altri sono stati danneggiati oltre qualsiasi possibilità di ricupero. A Spitak, 9 km dall'epicentro, nessun alloggio rimase utilizzabile. In tutta la zona interessata dal sisma i senzatetto furono 514.000.

Mentre, i due impianti termonucleari dell'Armenia non ricevettero danni (un colpo di fortuna, dato la loro mancanza di adeguati sistemi di sicurezza), 130 fabbriche furono danneggiate o distrutte, un duro colpo all'economia armena. Le perdite economiche ammontavano a US$15 miliardi.

Le frane sismiche erano numerosissime, come erano i fenomeni di liquefazione. Alcuni villaggi molto isolati furono colpiti da valanghe detritiche, causando perdite di vite, e diverse strade e linee di ferrovia interrotte dai movimenti franosi. Come in altri eventi sismici di impatto molto disperso, i soccorsi raggiunsero i villaggi più remoti soltanto con massiccio ritardo.

Il comportamento sismico degli edifici . La cattiva qualità del suolo sotto Kirovakan, Leninakan e Spitak causò il crollo di diversi edifici, ma the type and quality of construction they recorded much more. The older buildings were built of stone, often of a volcanic rock that broke during the seismic shaking. These buildings were very heavy horizontal elements of mattoneria or concrete, and then the dynamic load of the earthquake caused the crack angle to cause the collapse to the outside walls and the free fall of internal plans. However, many older buildings made of stone have withstood the earthquake, and most buildings had collapsed less than 15 years.

The more modern buildings were of reinforced concrete, often with preformed panels are also made of concrete. But the weakness of the joints in the frames Structural often leads to the progressive and total collapse of the building. If not, the scales fell off and collapsed during the seismic shaking, thus preventing the evacuation of occupants.

altisismiche standards in Armenia was insufficient in that it underestimated the probability of strong shaking and because they were based on an insufficient amount of data. However, while the quake was not likely in itself, the seismicity of the area was well known, such as to indicate the appropriate measures to be taken. But the Armenian authorities had ignored a fundamental scientific work of 1975, which clarified the need for earthquake resistant construction.

The epidemiology of infortuni . Dal terremoto di Guatemala del 1976, a quello di Armenia del 1988, si è imparato molto sugli infortuni causati dagli eventi sismici, specialmente in rapporto alle inefficienze delle operazioni di soccorso, l'inutilità dei materiali inviati nella zona disastrata, e la predominanza di ferite da schiacciamento dovute al crollo degli edifici scossi dal sisma.

Mentre alcune vittime morirono di asfissia a causa della polvere proveniente dagli edifici sgretolati dai tremori, molti sono morti schiacciati sotto travi e macerie. La "sindrome dello schiaccamento" avviene quando la proteina mioglobulina viene rilasciata in quantità massiccia nel flusso del sangue dalla rottura del tessuto muscolare. Essa finisce per impedire il funzionamento the kidneys, requiring immediate dialysis to save the life of the patient. Similar phenomena occur when potassium is released into the blood stream from the crushed cell disruption. In Yerevan, the kidney dialysis unit sent by the United States allowed the execution of 25-35 daily dialysis.

A sample of three Armenian villages, a total of 8,500 residents, showed a mortality of 49.5%, and a traumatic morbidity of 14.6%. But apart from the city level, the worst took place in some unusual buildings that collapsed with a mortality rate of over 90% of the occupants. Thus 205 of 215 workers died in a factory, and 285 of 302 children in a school. Typically, the plates constituent plans of such buildings disintegrated into fragments so small as not to give space to survive in the rubble.

Under the rubble lay about 40,000 people, of whom only 15,000 have been pulled out alive, most other survivors using only rudimentary tools. While some victim was rescued less than 19 days after the earthquake, 90% and saved lives of people trapped were freed within 24 hours after the main shock.

Logistics . The operations of search and rescue and relief efforts in general, were chaotic, inefficient and slow to begin. The weather alternated between snow fog, with night temperatures going down to-20EC. In fact, the situation weather, coupled with the fact that almost all hospitals in the area affected by the earthquake were not working anymore, slowing down relief efforts in particular. In addition, 80% of doctors and nurses in the area died in the earthquake. Then, the wounded had to be taken to Yerevan and Tbilisi. The lack of an adequate system of air traffic management, along with bad weather, had resulted in two aerial combat, with a total of 85 dead.

The problem of drugs. In the early days of the disaster are missed analgesics, antibiotics, anesthetics, intravenous fluids, syringes, stretchers, and equipment to transport the wounded.

Approximately 60 hours after the strike began rescue operation in which as many as 70 nations donavano money, manpower, food and other aid. Within a week after the disaster, the main airport in Yerevan operated 150 flights per day and 32 stores of donated material. Over 5,000 tonnes of medicines and medical supplies have arrived from abroad (25-30% by value of all donations), of which only 30% result, while 8% had expired and 11% were type useless. Most of the rest consisted of a total of 238 medicinal names in 21 different languages, making it impossible to identify the substance in question. The translations were rare in Russian and in Armenian non-existent. So at the end of the month you had to destroy 20% of medicines. In addition, a strategy efficiente per gestire i rifornimenti medici si è avuta soltanto 2 settimane dopo il disastro. Nel frattempo i produttori di medicinali hanno apparentemente colto l'occasione per scaricare i loro avanzi sulla zona disastrata.

Il contesto . Il terremoto armeno avvenne in mezzo ad un processo di trasformazione dell'Unione Sovietica. Fu il primo evento del genere in cui le autorità sovietiche accettarono una grande quantità di auiti dall'estero.

Tuttavia, la gravità del disastro non riuscì a cancellare le preesistenti preoccupazioni politiche: alcuni soccorritori azeri sono stati aggrediti dagli armeni, alcuni politici locali usavano la situazione per diffondere l'ultranazionalismo, le tensioni etniche grew strongly, and finally even the coprifuovo and the presence of 13,000 Soviet troops managed to contain the situation.

FIRE IN MEDITERRANEAN CALIFORNIA

brief summary. In the autumn of 1993 some spot fires in southern California burned 79,000 acres and 1,814 homes, especially in Malibu. Three people died in the flames. The event

. At the end of October 1993, a series of fires burned a large section of the Mediterranean's southern and most urbanized of the State of California. In six counties, including Los Angeles, 14 fire completely destroyed 731 houses and 66,800 hectares of heathland. Economic losses were estimated at more than $ 1 billion.

beginning of November 1993 nine other fires have killed three people, injured 111 and destroyed 1,084 homes, leaving more than 30,000 people homeless. In Malibu, 350 houses were destroyed, with damage amounting to $ 375 million. The injuries complained of smoke poisoning, burns and lung damage caused by breathing superheated air.

The Malibu fire began east of the city at 11.45 on November 2, 1993. In 4 hours, the flames traveled 19 km along the deep valleys carved into the coastal hills until it reaches the Pacific Ocean. The fire leapt in the air and 15-20 m beachfront palm trees burst spectacularly into flames.

Gusts a kind of Santa Ana wind threw hot and dry air at 90 mph and pushed the fire towards the urban area of \u200b\u200bthe coast, necessitating the evacuation of schools, factories, homes and a university. Many residents, worried about the fate of their homes, refused to evacuate. Therefore, rather than to fight the flames, firefighters in the middle of a residential area of \u200b\u200bEmerald Bay was used to save the lives of those who refused to go away.

Logistics . 7,000 firefighters were in the area. Undertook the bulldozers to remove combustible materials from the heath around Malibu, and it was great use of a different number of Bell-412 helicopters, capable of carrying 1,400 litri di acqua, e di aerei C-130, i quali possono trasportare 11.000 litri di sostanze chimiche utilizzate per sopprimere le fiamme. Tuttavia, i rischi erano troppo grossi per poter volare di notte.

La strategia per combattere l'incendio consisteva nella creazione di una serie di confini, mantenuti contro le fiamme da linee di pompieri insieme ai loro 250 mezzi. Si allestiva un posto di comando sul lungomare. Ma diverse volte, le linee sono state spezzate dalle fiamme, e di fronte a questo pericolo, si è dovuto ritirare anche il posto di comando. A Las Flores Creek, le fiamme passavano nel vento sopra i pompieri, i quali sono rimasti quasi circondati.

Gli incendi selvatici . Sebbene la protezione di risorse ad alto valore richieda l'impiego di un intervento sempre diretto e vigoroso, ogni giorno si dovrebbe formulare una nuova strategia per combattere l'incendio in base alle condizioni meteorologiche.

Un cosiddetto incendio selvatico brucia fuori controllo e minaccia le persone, gli insediamenti o altre risorse. Tramite barriere naturali o costruite, un incendio confinato viene limitato ad una determitata area, mentre il dilagarsi di un incendio contenuto viene impedito da una linea di controllo. Se quest'ultimo avvolge tutta la zona in fiamme, si ha un incendio diretto. L'incendio di Malibu fu prima contenuto e poi diretto.

Quando bruciano i rami e le foglie di un albero si ha un incendio di corona, che può divampare in rapporto alle fiamme in superficie (incendio dipendente) o propagarsi direttamente da un'albero all'altro (incendio scorrevole). La maggior parte degli incendi nella macchia mediterranea sono incendi dipendenti di corona e incendi di superficie, e possono causare incendi nel terreno ("ground fires") se il materiale combustibile giace sul terreno in uno strato spesso e consistente. I back-burns ("incendi ripassanti") possono avvenire se il materiale combustibile non viene interamente consumato dal primo passaggio delle fiamme, e se il vento cambia direzione tale da rispingere l'incendio indietro. I venti forti possono causare gli incendi a chiazza quando essi gettano frasche brucianti davanti alla linea del fuoco. Nella macchia, la temperatura dell'incendio può raggiungere 1100EC.

A Malibu si ebbe un incendio di superficie con elementi di incendio di corona che si autopropagava da un albero ad un altro. La radiazione e la circolazione dell'aria stimulava l'incendio a propagarsi sulle colline, non soltanto a progredire verso il mare spinto dal vento. Come spesso accade, le irregolarità del vento e della distribuzione territoriale di materiali combustibili spingevano il fronte dell'incendio in forma irregolare caratterizzata dal frequente scoppio di incendi a chiazza.

L'erosione accelerata e altri effetti ambientali . Dieci giorni dopo l'incendio a Malibu, la caduta di 4 cm di pioggia in 24 ore diede luogo ad un episodio di erosione accelerata nella zona bruciata, compresa una serie di colate of mud houses and took away a part of the coastal road.

When vegetation burns the Mediterranean, it distills some natural chemicals that waterproof the soil with a hydrophobic layer. At the same time the destruction of green vegetation by erosion, which is enhanced by the increased flow of water on the barrier layer. The result is a series of mudslides that come with the first rains after the fire.

The high frequency of fires, the power of deadly landslides and the continued urbanization of new areas determines the decline of populations of species of rare birds. California fires of 1993 have left a fragmented habitat so che alcune specie di avifauna rara probabilmente non riusciranno a superare la scossa.

Il rischio di incendio in California . Ogni anno circa 3.000 incendi scoppiano nelle macchie della California meridionale. Molti sono di origine dolosa, ma meno del 20% delle persone colpevoli vengono soperte.

Come altrove, in California il rischio di incendio raggiunge un massimo nelle aree tra le zone di nuova urbanizzazione e il terreno ancora in stato naturale. Sono delle aree di massima crescita demografica e quindi di grande frequenza degli incendi, i quali causano danni ingenti e costosi nel giro di poche ore. Circa un terzo del costo consiste nelle spese per combattere l'incendio.

Buone risposte al rischio . The devastating fires of 1970 and 1977 had resulted in the creation of the California Firescope, a structure based on a centralized Incident Command System (ICS) and a multi-agency Coordination System (MACS), with a center with a sophisticated system Fire Information. The emergency intervention is based on weather forecasts and infrared surveillance of areas of potential fire. In the case of the rapid development of a large fire, the key to effective intervention is the system of mutual assistance between the various regional and local authorities, which guarantees a certain level of timely workforce against the flames.

Un'incendio catastrophic stimulates certain measures, how to broaden the access routes to areas most at risk, buy more equipment (like air Canadian CL-215 "super scooper", which is able to lift 6,000 liters of water in just 12 seconds), and improve planning and coordination of emergency operations. Also, because burning some houses and spare others, the fire can also demonstrate the utility of standards for reducing inflammability of building materials.

good response to risk . In California, as elsewhere, the use of appropriate fire regulations varies from place to place as the tendency to follow them. After the great fire of 1991 in Oakland, 25% of homes not rebuilt were the measures required by new legislation to prevent the spread of the flames.

Repeated public opinion polls in California showed a progressive increase in the sensitivity of the fire problem, but without a tendency to take sufficient measures to mitigate the risk.

Despite a great plan for insurance against fire damage, insurance companies have done little to encourage their customers to reduce the risk of fire. In summary, some researchers argue that the offer of generous loans and repayments has almost rewarded the owners of homes burned for failing to mitigate the risk.

avalanches in the Alps EUROPEAN

Executive Summary . Diverse valanghe di neve uccisero 150 persone nel Dipartimento francese di Savoia, nell'alta valle del Rodano in Svizzera e nel Tirolo austriaco. In ciascun paese i disastri diedero luogo a nuovi programmi di mitigazione del rischio di valanga.

Gli eventi di febbraio 1970 . Nelle Alpi europee i disastri causati dalle valanghe di neve avvengono in base allo spessore della coltre di neve, alle condizioni meteorologiche e all'uso del terreno in fondo ai versanti interessati dall'instabilità. Avvengono due tipi di catastrofe. Nel primo, le condizioni meteorologiche favorevoli alle valanghe durano a lungo, dando luogo ad un alto rischio che continua per lunghi periodi. Ad esempio, nell'inverno del 1950-1, 650 persone morirono in una serie di valanghe alpine che complessivamente distrussero 2.500 edifici.

Nel secondo tipo, disastri provocati da singoli eventi che interessano soprattutto gruppi di sciatori o alpinisti avvengono negli anni di rischio generalmente basso. Così, in Svizzera nel 1960 un gruppo di 88 lavoratori morirono sotto una valanga proveniente da un ghiacciaio.

L'anno 1970 offre un buon esempio del primo tipo, una stagione disastrosa, che induceva ad una rivalutazione generale delle precauzioni contro le valanghe alpine.

Nel febbraio del 1970 le temperature nelle Alpi oscillavano continuamente intorno allo zero, con notevoli inalzamenti quotidiani. Nelle aree ad alta quota e sui versanti piuttosto ripidi, questa situazione provocava growing instability in dense layers of snow earlier by a heavy snowfall.

On February 10, 42 people died and 60 were injured by an avalanche in Val d'Isere in the French department of Savoie. It was a movement of powder snow, with a 45-90 front off me when to stop a thickness of 3.65 m. Invaded a youth hostel, where thirty young people died asphyxiated or crushed, while another dozen people was swept away from outside the building. The hostel was built only 7 years before his site was not considered a place of particular risk and was also protected on top by a series of concrete blocks, which, however, does not help stop the avalanche.

From the French authorities, the rapid recognition of a potential danger for the immediate closure of Val d'Isère. A helicopter was able to evacuate the wounded once before worsening weather conditions such as to block any possibility of flying. The first convoy of cars coming out of the valley was hit by a new avalanche, while a similar event elsewhere killed a child. As soon as possible, the authorities evacuated 5,000 people from hotels and residences in the area.

Following the disaster took issue much on the apparent reluctance of French authorities to invest in structural measures for mitigation of avalanches (tunnels, fences, roofs, etc.). When you invest a lot in the promotion of winter sports. Having recently moved from Chambéry to Grenoble, the National Institute for Research on Snow had just lost his representative in Val d'Isere.

Later that month, in Switzerland 11 people were killed and 19 injured by an avalanche that had not seen such a site in that more than half a century. Despite that 500 troops and 12 dogs to search for survivors, it was not easy to evacuate the victims amid the snow and the continued risk of further avalanches.

February 25, a village on Mount Cenis in the French Alps was hit by an avalanche 10 times greater than that of Val d'Isère. Seven lives were lost. The movement was immediately preceded by a pressure wave that demolished several buildings. It took 13 hours to extract the victims from the snow. The same day an avalanche killed two people in the Tyrol in the middle of the main street of St Leonhard Pitztal am. In the Austrian provinces of Tyrol and Vorarlberg avalanches were so widespread as to prevent the evacuation of 14,000 people.

Meanwhile, the Swiss made extensive use of explosive material thrown from helicopters to trigger avalanches before the snow accumulation can be dangerous. In Italy, meanwhile, seven soldiers died in an avalanche during their exercises.

The events of April 1970. On April 15, 1970, when temperatures were unusually alte per la stagione, una valanga a lastre di ghiaccio colpì un sanatorio nell'Alta Savoia francese. Si dovettero impegnare 21 ruspe per setacciare le macerie, da cui furono estratte 72 salme, 56 delle quali bambini. Alcuni ulteriori movimenti di neve, ghiaccio e macerie ferirono 13 soccorritori.

Il rischio valanga nelle Alpi . Nelle Alpi europee, come in altre catene montuose, le cifre degli infortuni per valanga variano parecchio da un anno all'altro. In Svizzera, ad esempio, la media è di 17.480 eventi e 24 morti, ma questo può variare di diversi ordini di magnitudine.

Le popolazioni indigene continuano a diminuire nelle aree alpine, mentre aumentano quelle saltuarie, le quali non sempre conoscono bene i rischi. In solo 30 anni alcuni centri sciistici nelle Alpi sono cresciuti di 20-50 volte rispetto alle loro dimensioni nel 1945. Intanto, le popolazioni di vacanzieri aumentano proprio nel periodo di massimo pericolo di valanga.

Nell'inverno del 1970 i rischi variavano con le condizioni meteorologiche. In febbraio avvenivano valanghe di neve polverosa associate con il freddo. Erano di una rapidità tale da causare onde di pressione capaci di travolgere persone ed edifici. Invece, le valanghe di aprile erano composte di lastre di ghiaccio, le quali generavano pressioni di impatto in rapporto con la loro più alta densità. Gli eventi di febbraio erano la conseguenza di tempeste, quelli di aprile di scioglimenti.

Il salvataggio . Si riscontravano grande difficoltà di estrarre le vittime dalla neve delle valanghe di febbraio 1970. I cani, che in Svizzera trovano il 50% delle persone sepolte sotto la neve, non riuscirono a individuare una persona intrappolata a più di un metro sotto la superficie. La neve più profonda richiede le sonde con pali, sonar oppure sensori ad infrarosso, ma la ricerca diventa assai difficile quando una forte nevicata è in atto.

La mitigazione . Le valanghe del 1970 hanno dato luogo ad un potenziamento delle previsioni del tempo che causa le valanghe. Ma gli eventi di aprile 1970 non furono di un tipo particolarmente prevedibile, ed inoltre una previsione è valida soltanto se viene collegata con un programma di structural and non-structural mitigation, including the planning of human settlements and the evacuation of populations during periods of highest risk.

For many years the French and Swiss have collected and compiled data on avalanche risk charts at scales ranging from 1:10.000 to 1:50.000. During the 70 municipalities of Alpine France undertook to plan their urban growth on the basis of risk mapping of flood by prohibiting new construction in areas "red" and limiting the areas 'blue'. However, some similar initiatives in Switzerland have been hampered by the division of resposabilità for urban zoning between the governments of the cantons and the federal state. This situation brought a remarkable heterogeneity of planning legislation against the danger of avalanches.

Despite this, the Swiss have made extensive use of structural methods nonstrutturali and mitigation of avalanches, using a good combination of measures. Instead, the Italians, for the most part, have used expensive structural measures, which were contrabilanciate by massive deforestation and a major development of sports facilities.

In summary, the Alpine winter disaster of 1970 represented an excellent window of opportunity "to introduce certain mitigation measures. However, the expansion of tourism and mountain sports has helped keep fairly constant number of disasters due to avalanches, although their amount is decreased due to better forecasting and planning against the Avalanche.

Aberfan TO LANDSLIDE IN WALES

brief summary. A pile of debris from a coal mine collapsed on Aberfan, a mining town in South Wales. The landslide destroyed 18 homes and an elementary school and killed 116 children and 18 adults. The event

. At 09:15 of October 21, 1966, landslide 117,000 m of debris from a coal mine and piled in a heap of height 67 meters. In a series of waves, the water-saturated debris flow traveled at 15-30 km / hr along a slope E. slope of 12.5 Approximately 75,000 m of debris stood at the foot of the heap, but 42,000 ft, traveled another 100 meters and came in the middle of the adjacent village of Aberfan (pop. 4,000), forming a deposit often 7-9 meters. The debris flow

demolished two houses and crushed their occupants. Later destroyed a school full of children and 18 homes in the country. Of the 144 people affected by the flow is not saved. Among the dead were five teachers and 109 school children aged between 7 and 10 years. Seven other children died and 29 other children and six adults were injured, some seriously. Several houses were flooded by water coming from the lava flows and broken un'acquedotto.

Conditions antestante . Since the '20s the debris from the mine had been stored in 7 piles of height between 17 and 67 m. In 1962 he began a process of refining of coal that left pieces of scrap were later dumped in seventh pile of ashes which made up 39% and 6-8% water. Consequently, this combination had a low density and was saturated with water from a natural spring located mainly in the mass of debris. No report was ever made to geological sites of the seven piles.

In the 70s Britain produced and released into open some 50 million tons of rock material of the type that has crumbled to Aberfan. In 1939 about 180,000 tons of debris from a mine near Aberfan had slid for a distance of 400 m across the main street of the area. But in 1966 the villagers took care of most of the risk of flooding, given that several times during wet periods the water flowed in the streets and entered houses. In fact, despite the advent of small movements in 1944 and 1963, the engineers did not anticipate that happening in coarse materials flows as well as those of the heaps of debris from the mines.

The reaction to the disaster. The disaster was followed immediately by a massive "response to convergence", where the labor force and help arrived at Aberfan in excess. Accumulating a fund for the victims, from 1,750,000 in donations, not only from all over the UK but also from 40 other nations. Despite a series of disputes between the trustees and the survivors of the disaster, the money was well used to compensate those who denounced the material losses, to create a memorial to the victims, and to build a community center for the country. However it could not mitigate the fact that a very supportive community had lost almost an entire generation of his children.

A question of responsibility. At first, neither the Welsh Office of the British government nor the National Board for Coal (NCB), admitted responsibility for the disaster. The villagers of Aberfan were fighting with all their strength to prosecute the guilty, but was found a thick resistance from the authorities. In addition, the NCB refused to raze the mounds of debris, which continued to constitute a danger to the country is a symbol of disgrace. Finally, public opinion forced the government to allocate funds for the removal of all the piles 7. The court of inquiry found 9 dell'NCB officers guilty of gross negligence, but the law was not that they could be prosecuted, and in fact even the dell'NCB Director had resigned. In summary, despite clear indications to the contrary, for many years before the disaster, the NCB repeatedly assured the people of Aberfan that there was danger of a collapse in heaps of debris. Following the disaster denied any responsibility for it was not forced by the court to admit his guilt. But the court failed to prosecute persons who with their actions had caused the disaster.

A notable aspect of the disaster in Aberfan is the total lack of plans, regulations, and standards expertise to manage the process of unloading around the mines. As usually happens in such cases, immediately after the disaster the laws were updated to remedy. But by then the eminent engineer Prof. Alan Bishop of Imperial College, London University, had shown by calculation and physical models which, under the circumstances, Aberfan era un disastro inevitabile.

Aspetti umani della tragedia . Dato un certo consenso al fatto che i minatori pagano un prezzo sproporzionato per la creazione del benessere della società, gli abitanti del Regno Unito e di altri paesi provavano grande compassione e simpatia verso Aberfan. Essendo profondamente scossi dal disastro, molti abitanti, poco abituati a stare al centro dell'attenzione, non erano felici dell'invadenza del mondo esterno. Però, la solidarietà del paese ha retto e poche persone e famiglie si sono traslocate al di fuori della zona. Ma tale era la scossa psicologica che molti dei sopravissuti di Aberfan negavano per anni che la tragedia fosse successa. Come nella colata detritica di Buffalo Creek, Pennsylvania (Also from a mine), which killed 118 people in 1972, among the victims of Aberfan was noted a "survivor syndrome", consisting of an inner terror, a tendency to relive the tragedy and a state of "psychological paralysis "or a" temporary collapse of ego. "

Finally, the deadly mudslides caused by mining activities continue to happen, as the Italian case is one example of the Val Was, 1985, in which 264 people died.

LANDSLIDE IN ANCONA

brief summary. The landslide of 1982 interested in 341 acres of the northern city of Ancona. It destroyed 476 buildings and left 3,661 homeless.
The event
. During the night of December 13, 1982 a landslide interested in the slope of the hillock at the north side of the city of Ancona and Marche on the coast of the Adriatic Sea. 294 residential buildings were damaged, consisting of 1,025 apartments and 182 other buildings, including two hospitals, a gym and the Faculty of Medicine, University of Ancona, some churches, a cemetery, several factories, a few farms, a barracks of the forces of 'order, and some workshops and industrial applications. The victims were 3,661, of whom one patient died when he had to be evacuated from the intensive care unit of one of the hospitals affected by the landslide. The town of

Borghetto had to be entirely demolished, and some parts of the suburbs of Ancona Posatora, Pinocchio, Palombella and Towers suffered serious damage. Severe impacts were also found by the road through the area and the Adriatic railway, which passes over the foot of the landslide. In addition, light pipes, gas and electricity were cut. The cost of the damage was estimated as £ 1 trillion.

causes. The move came after several weeks of rain. While the seismic shaking could have contributed to the destabilization of the slope, was not a trigger for the movement of 1982. The causes included the long-term effect in increasing coastal erosion the steepness of the slope, and mismanagement of the infiltration of rain and drainage of the slope in areas of recent and current urban growth. The main cause was the high short-term pore pressure of soil moisture, especially at the top of the slope.

History . At the point the slope of the landslide Montagnolo reaches 251 m above sea level, is off my 1400 has a slope that varies from 9 to 18E. The area was affected by problems of stability since 1770, when postal links were interrupted frequently by surface movements on the old road through the area. At the beginning of the twentieth century, a landslide destroyed 16 hectares of the tannery Barden and licked the rail at the base of the slope. An engineer called by the State Railway to make a geological survey concluded that the slope of the exceptional measures needed to ensure its stability. Barden located upstream of the landslide, the old house is placed upstream spectacularly revolved around 3E, constituting a clear testimony to the instability of the area.

In the 70s the General Regulatory Plan of Ancona took a large urban sprawl to the north of the city. In 1970 an employee of the Geological Survey of state he predicts accurately the mechanism and extent of the landslide (with 12 years in advance) and suggested a series of engineering measures to consolidate the area at risk. However, very few of the proposed works were built. Instead, the urbanization of the area continued with the construction of houses and buildings in the middle of the unstable area and the faculty of medicine at the foot of the old landslide Barden. Further geotechnical report, published in the Bulletin of the Italian Geological Society in 1974, concluded that the area was essentially stable, although, strangely, the data presented in that work showed exactly the opposite.

The mechanism of movement. The slope of a lithology Montagnolo there is a little complicated, which is composed of clay cracked blue board, with varying degrees of compactness, and a slightly consolidated sand. The geological investigations following the disaster concluded that the landslide took place on a cutting plane located up to 120 m below the surface of the slope. However, data from drilling and inclinometers did not confirm this hypothesis, and is more likely that the extraordinary size of the movement is a progressive movement of plates of land due to a change in the type "shear deformation" at a depth no greater than 40 -45 m, with involvement of the rest of the slope because of the shift of its overall balance.

teleosservazione The infrared shows the presence of two substantial patches of soil moisture, one just below the crown of the head of the landslide detachment, and the other near di una trincea di subsidenza che si apriva in mezzo della frana a causa dei movimenti distensionali franosi e della presenza di una faglia normale che attraversa il versante in direzione nord-sud.

Il comportamento degli edifici . La grande frana di Ancona ha fornito molta informazione sulla reazione di edifici di vari tipi alle forze e ai movimenti indotti da un grosso e complesso movimento franoso. Le strutture più vecchie erano di mattoni rossi cotti, di modeste dimensioni e quasi prive di fondazioni. Invece, le strutture più moderne erano per la maggior parte di cemento armato, sebbene nella zona vi fosse qualche struttura in acciaio. La spaccatura dovuta alla frana tendeva ad esser unidirezionale e a risultare da una pressione sostenuta causata dalla subsidenza, dal rigonfiamento o dalla spinta proveniente dal movimento franoso. Dove la subsidenza differenziale ha interessato le fondazioni, un edificio con struttura portante in cemento armato poteva inclinarsi fino a 6,5E senza crollare, ma nella maggior parte dei casi un'inclinazione di 2-3E era sufficiente per compromettere la stabilità dell'edifico irrimediabilmente. Se i pannelli della facciata fossero ben ancorati alla struttura portante, un edificio in acciaio poteva resistere la conpressione senza crollare fino ad un metro di deformazione.

In genere, gli edifici in cemento armato funzionavano meglio di tutti gli altri sotto il carico della frana, dato che il grado di integrazione delle loro strutture permetteva loro di resistere massive forces. The risk was highest where buildings were located through the steep, landslide, and then where they suffered from severe differential movements, which might tilt, swivel, compression or distension of their structures.

Conclusion. In summary, the Ancona landslide disaster was another highly anticipated and in fact often provided with ample time in advance. While interpretations may vary, the data showed very clearly that the presence of a high degree of risk of instability were freely available throughout the period of urban expansion antestante the disaster. In the years before and after the event, almost every aspect of the disaster was politicizzato, con l'effetto che si stentava e si stenta ancora a separare la realtà oggettiva dalle speculazioni e dalle opinioni prive di fondamenta. Con il senno di poi, la questione principale ancora da risolvere è quanto il disastro risultava da una trasformazione ambientale basata su un'ignoranza del rischio di frana e quanto invece essa risultava da una speculazione che deliberatamente ignorava il rischio. La catastrofe, con il suo elevato costo in termini di denaro pubblico, dimostra il pericolo, non soltanto di una mancanza di controllo ambientale dei processi di urbanizzazione, ma anche dei rischi inerenti a un controllo in cui il colpevole è anche il giudice e la giuria del risultante processo.

Can I Wear My Grandfathers Freemason Ring

vulnerability to natural disasters and mitigation of risk: the lessons of the past and the way of

Summary. This article describes the current status of the impacts, vulnerability, risk and mitigation of natural disasters. It is faced with a fundamental difference between the level of risk, and strategies used to deal with it in industrialized countries and those in developing countries. In the latter succeeded the most disaster and the worst effect on the population, especially in the case of so-called "complex disasters" in which humanitarian emergencies and military match. The developed countries instead denounced the major economic impacts, growth of which has not been halted despite the constant use of technologies mitigation increasingly sophisticated. We then describe the new trends in emergency management, including the increasing use of information technology network, but there are still few signs of the transfer of information technology in the Third World. To illustrate the phenomenology of a single risk, and to draw lessons relevant to mitigation, we describe the epidemiological effects of recent earthquakes. Then, to make a comparison with the approach of "all-hazards", is an example of the vulnerability to natural disasters of Italy. Finally, we examine the global outlook for the mitigation of natural disasters and provides a theoretical framework for future research in the future.



Introduction In 1990 the United Nations opened an International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction, a global initiative that had the goal of halving the rate of death and destruction caused by extreme geophysical events (USNRC 1994 ). As the decade is in its second half, it is clear that the purpose will not be achieved and the progress accomplished so far provided results quite modest. On the one hand, however, there have been significant improvements in the level of general knowledge of disasters and their consequences. More information is available and have been tested more than ever, with better results in terms of mitigation and civil protection. The institutional structures have been strengthened, both in terms of super-national organizations such as the Department of Humanitarian Affairs (UN-DHA) in the same United Nations, both for national organizations that deal with disasters. New research centers were created and new academic journals founded, and has taken a major step forward in the availability and quality of training in the field of emergency management.

Mortality in natural disasters was held at relatively constant, a result which is perhaps not insignificant, given the growth of world population. But the cost of disasters continues to increase dramatically. For example, the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake in California to cost between $ 6 and U.S. 12 billion. In 1992, Hurricane Andrew caused $ 18 billion of losses in Florida and it was feared that the next big disaster could cost more than $ 40 billion (Berz 1994). Then, in January 1995, the Kobe earthquake in Japan caused losses valued at U.S. $ 131.5 billion (Japanese IDNDR Committee 1995), and now they fear even greater losses in major disasters of the future.

For the first 90 years data have estimated the cost of damage in natural disasters as U.S. $ 443.8 billion (IFRCRCS 1996). Approximately one third of this amount comes from the big disasters, each of which costs on average $ 350 million to 500 million (Berz 1992). Although the economic losses have been particularly high in developed countries, floods and droughts, for example, affect only 0.1% of their average PLN, while in some developing countries particularly affected by natural disasters, to 2% of PLN is absorbed by the losses in disasters (Alexander 1993a, p. 583). In some poor countries, particularly major disasters have sometimes come at the cost PLN for a whole year, as in the case of the Nicaraguan earthquake of 1972 (Kates et al. 1973).

From its earliest beginnings (Prince 1920, Sorokin 1942, White 1945, Barton 1969) study of disasters has grown into a true discipline, although organized around at least six different schools of thought (Alexander 1993a, pp. 12-14). Although various attempts have been made to unify the social sciences and natural disasters on the subject (Nemec et al 1993), still remains a fundamental disagreement. There is a strong difference of opinion on the fact that the social organization or technological systems are the key to mitigation of disasters (Hewitt 1983). Recently, some sociologists have argued that natural disasters are actually caused by the inadequacies of the social system, thus relegating him to a secondary role geophysical events (Kreps 1995). This is a way of saying that physical events are repetitive and predictable enough to be considered risk "normal" of everyday life. The most significant variable becomes the vulnerability of human social systems and therefore the causes of disasters are nell'inabilità sought to mitigate, or even to perceive the risks. However, this approach has been vigorously disputed by, among others, some geographers who prefer a more traditional model of causes and effects that seeks to integrate the physical impact on the socio-economic response (Hewitt 1995).

Nevertheless, several decades of geophysical and socio-scientific research has firmly established the intellectual and scientific study of disasters. The areas of the world at risk of natural disasters have been mapped in many cases the intervals recurrence of the disasters have been established, and future impact are now largely predictable (Smith 1992). The loss data indicate that each year some 200 natural disasters killed 144,000 people, injured 57,000, leaving 4.9 million homeless and have a direct impact on the lives of 129 million other people (IFRCRCS 1996). The investigations have outlined the stages of social disaster and have clarified the organizational responses, personal perceptions, people's reactions, and regularities in social disaster. Thus, each new event framework evolves in a highly predictable, which partially replicates the trend of the disasters of the past.

vulnerability and mitigation disasters in developing countries

In the 90 disasters tend to exacerbate the already serious differences between the impacts in industrialized countries and those in developing countries (Blaikie et al 1994). First of all, about 80% of the impacts of natural disasters and 95% of deaths occur in Third World (Cuny 1983). Moreover, the effects are distributed very unevenly, such that a load is disproportionately borne by some particular countries such as China, India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, the Philippines, Ethiopia, Peru.

In order to explain the discrepancy in the response to disasters in countries with different levels of development, the situation Japan will be compared with that in the Philippines. In Japan, public safety is constantly threatened by earthquakes, tsunamis, landslides, floods, typhoons and volcanic eruptions. The risk of such extreme events is faced with a high degree of organization of civil protection, a high level of investment in technology for monitoring and early warning, and a strong support for geophysical research. Although it is far from infallible, the Japanese response to disasters is to be considered quickly and efficiently (UNDHA 1995, Japanese IDNDR Committee 1995).

risk natural conditions are very similar in the Philippines, where an average of 20 typhoons pass every year (in 1993 there were 32). However, despite efforts in the organization of civil protection, public education and training to deal with emergencies, the country faces a risk of natural disasters flattened by the Japanese resources lags far behind the Nipponese: The PLN is only 2 , 75% of the Japanese and about 49% of the population lives below the poverty line. In addition, poverty has shown strong links to environmental degradation, and there are clear signs that this problem increases the effects of disasters: floods caused by typhoons and landslides caused by earthquakes have their worst effects in areas (such as in the mountains of Baguio northern Luzon), where agricultural land is subject to strong dissesti idrogeologici (Broad e Cavanagh 1993). In sintesi, il costo dei disastri è maggiore in Giappone, ma la mortalità e ben 9 volte più alta nelle Filippine.

Nell'ambito delle singole nazioni è chiaro che gli effetti delle calamità naturali sono distribuiti in modo molto disuguale secondo forti differenze nella vulnerabilità dei diversi gruppi sociali. In molte città del Terzo Mondo i poveri e chi non possiede il terreno sono costretti ad occupare i siti più pericolosi: versanti tropicali instabili, fondi di valli altamente alluvionabili, pianure litorali minacciate da onde di tempesta, e così via (Havelick 1986). La mortalità nei disastri viene quindi concentrata nei barrios, nelle favilas, nei bidonvilles e negli slums che sono frutto di una crescita urbana rapida e senza pianificazione, scene di povertà non alleviata. Comunque, la marginalizzazione, la negazione al popolo di una voce politica e di una sicurezza economica, è un fenomeno più generale nel senso che essa affligge anche le aree rurali (Blaikie 1985, p. 125). È un fenomeno in aumento a livello mondiale e la sfida che pone agli enti di aiuto internazionale ha stimolato la formulazione di nuove idee su come integrare il soccorso dei disastri con lo sviluppo economico (Anderson e Woodrow 1989). Infatti, lo sviluppo socio-economico è da molto tempo conosciuto come chiave alla mitigazione delle catastrofi, ma solo recentemente si assiste ad un cambiamento significativo dal fornire aid after the impact of disasters in some form of aid that seeks to prevent disasters or reduce its effects by promoting economic development and community safety. There was then a belated recognition that, instead of being an interruption to the process of development, disasters are an integral and expected part of daily life in areas that affect them (Maxwell and Buchanan-Smith 1994). They must be treated as part of the normal barriers to development, not as separate phenomena and anomalous.

This picture was however complicated by what is called the "complex emergencies" (Duffield 1994). In Somalia and Ethiopia, for example, floods and droughts occur periodically in the context of other equally pressing issues: the military conflict, the war of low intensity guerrilla command hosted by the collapse of the state, the politicization of relief, refugees, the proliferation of international and domestic, so-called internally displaced persons (IDPs ), the uncertain supply of food, attacks on aid workers (Gallagher and Martin Forbes 1992). So the rescue after a disaster takes a more integrated but more complicated. Must keep in mind that the production and distribution of food have become more essential in a highly political issue in the monitoring of aid, including its limitations or its destruction, are often part of una strategia militare usata per sopprimere l'opposizione. Quindi, nelle "emergenze complesse" moderne i civili non-combattenti diventano le principali vittime sia dei disastri naturali che della deliberata creazione di insicurezza sociale tramite la manipolazione degli aiuti umanitari.

La vulnerabilità e la mitigazione dei disastri nei paesi sviluppati

Secondo la tendenza attuale, le perdite economiche sono concentrate nei paesi industrializzati mentre l'impatto umano dei disastri è maggiore nelle nazioni in via di sviluppo. I primi hanno fatto un grande progresso nella progettazione di sistemi di monitoraggio e di preallarme, nell'adeguamento degli edifici a norme di sicurezza sempre più stringenti, e nell'allestimento evacuation procedures, and improving public safety. This has facilitated the gradual reduction of mortality at low levels. In the U.S., for example, the hurricane that hit Galveston in 1900 claimed the lives of 6,000 Texans, but the hurricanes of the 90s, which are preceded by the evacuation up to a half million residents of the coastal strip, have so far procured very few victims (Fernandez-Partagas and Rappoport 1995). Similarly, the use of Doppler radar, networks of volunteer observers, early warning systems, shelters and prior designation have reduced the mortality of tornadoes in the Midwest in fewer than one hundred per year, while forty ago individual tornadoes often cause higher numbers of deaths (Eidson et al 1990). But at the same time urban and suburban development continues to increase the quantity and value of property in areas of repeated impact of disasters, while the structural protection fails to meet the growing need for risk mitigation.

In the industrialized world efforts to reduce the impacts of disasters have been rather opposed the creation of new sources of vulnerability and by the amplification of existing sources. Even where the cultural roots of the company provide a solid historical basis for the reactions to disasters, there is a continuous process of transformation socio-economic, which leads, in particular, the creation of a universal consumer culture based on free market capitalism, in which disasters are essentially taking the form of stages of accelerated consumption of resources. Paradoxically, despite the current decline in the state's role in many aspects of welfare and the economy, there was a general increase in the level and intensity of state intervention in the field of civil protection and assistance after disasters. But usually the innovations in the way disasters are dealt with following the events themselves (the so-called "window of opportunity", see Solecki and Michaels 1994). In the period following the impact of public opinion is more sensitive issue and requires immediate government action to improve safety. In this sense, the disasters of the 80s and 90s have led many developed countries to plan civil protection measures, to create the necessary institutional and bureaucratic structure, to establish measures to mitigate risk and to set up training programs for workers emergency.

Several trends have emerged in the way emergencies are addressed. First, the traditional structure of "monolithic" in the chain of command has become unpopular and is often replaced by the "incident command system" ( Incident Command System - ICS ), in which business units are working independently in parallel, rather than in a subject hierarchy (Irwin 1991). The key to the success of the ICS is the communication between the agencies working on the disaster. If the flow of information is sufficient, efforts should not be either duplicated or neglected, all the important tasks will be executed and the operational units should mutually address their collective needs. Then the second trend is the improvement of real-time communication during disasters. In this context, the Internet will play an increasingly important and has already proved sufficiently flexible and rapid emergency management (for example, the countries of the G-7 have organized an initiative to promote a Global Information Society which included a proposal for the use of the Internet to set up a global system for emergency management - see http://info.ic.gc.ca/G7 / ). The Internet not only allows the almost instantaneous transmission of text, data and images, but also to follow the emergence of individuals wherever they are in the world, a fact that opens the door to the participation of experts of every kind, from any part of the world. The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency has won the first use of the Internet to disseminate news and information on how to mitigate disasters. Its World Wide Web site ( http://www.fema.gov/ ) is used by millions of users and provides a model for similar initiatives elsewhere.

A third trend is that of automation of the process of microzonizzazione risk. The geographical information systems (GIS) are now widely used for the analysis and display of spatial data on vulnerability and impacts of disasters (Carrara and Guzzetti 1995). Through the integration of risk information with socio-economic data, they allow the development of hazard scenarios and planning responses to future disasters. The use of GIS has been crucial in fostering a shift in local and regional planning from the study individual risk to a more general type "all-hazards" in which one studies the general danger zone in terms of all the risks that have local significance. This process was considered too expensive for general use when you had to do manually, but the arrival of information technology programs and the availability of flexible and affordable GIS has made possible the all-hazards microzonizzazione the level of individual municipalities . In the United States Federal Emergency Management Agency has sponsored the development of a national GIS, called HAZUS (stands for "Hazards in the United States"), which will be used by states, the counties and individual municipalities, especially metropolitan ones, to determine the natural and technological hazards, to plan emergency responses and to mitigate the impacts of disasters (RMS 1993).

In addition, there is a growing trend to have the mitigation of risk is a condition of financial assistance, the state after the disaster. In most areas at risk of natural disaster occurrence intervals are known approximant, as are the likely consequences of the impacts of disasters. The microzonizzazione and vulnerability analysis can provide more detail (Foster 1980). So there are few reasons to say that the amount of future damage is unpredictable. In addition, the cost: beneficio dell'investimento nelle tecniche di mitigazione sono quasi sempre positivi in termini del valore dei danni evitati (Petak e Atkisson 1982). Nello stesso tempo, il bisogno di ridurre il budget fiscale induce molti governi a cercare un modo per limitare le spese di soccorso. Si cerca un nuovo ruolo per l'assicurazione, in cui la mitigazione del rischio è la chiave sia alla riduzione del rischio, che all'abbassamento del costo dei premi (Kunreuther e Miller 1985).

Mentre l'impatto globale delle alluvioni, della siccità e delle tempeste tropicali è più catastrofico, sia in termini umani che in quelli economici, i terremoti forse rappresentano meglio il tipico disastro di impatto immediato. Annualmente il danno dovuto ai sismi ammonta a US$50.9 miliardi e viene distribuito largamente nel mondo (IFRCRCS 1996). In modo tale da offrire un esempio dettagliato della fenomenologia dei disastri moderni, la seguente sezione esaminerà alcune delle caratteristiche epidemiologiche dei disastri sismici avvenuti a metà degli anni '90.

I disastri sismici recenti, 1993-96

Nel periodo settembre 1993 - settembre 1996 ben 54 terremoti hanno causato infortuni: 43 (circa 14 all'anno) hanno causato morti mentre 47 (circa 16 all'anno) hanno provocato feriti. Durante questo periodo 19.969 persone hanno perso la vita e 89.419 hanno subito ferite nei disastri sismici. La mortalità media annuale di 6.656 è relativamente bassa in paragone with the average of the last 25 years, which is 21,593 (IFRCRCS 1996). This fact reflects the absence in the study period of major events such as the Tangshan earthquake in China (1976), which killed 240,000 people. However, the annual average of injury for the period 1993-96, 29,806 people, is very close to that of the last 25 years.

While earthquakes of magnitude 6.5 to 7.5 were only 43% of the events that led to accidents (which were in their turn about 60% of all earthquakes that caused damage in the period in question), we had 84% of the deaths and 96% of the injured in these events. One can therefore assume that the events of magnitude lower caused less injury, while quelli di magnitudo più alta erano infrequenti ed isolati tale da non causare grande mortalità nel periodo studiato. Circa il 93% dei morti e il 77% delle ferite sono stati causati da terremoti che accadevano tra mezzanotte e le 6,00 di mattina (malgrado il fatto che questi costituivano soltanto il 33% dei terremoti che provocavano infortuni). Questo fatto indica che il rischio di mortalità o morbilità nei terremoti è significativamente più alto di notte (Alexander 1996).

Gli eventi studiati confermano che il crollo degli edifici è la fonte principale degli infortuni nei terremoti (Page et alii 1975). Ma è anche chiaro che nella maggior parte dei sismi le vittime sono concentrate in relativamente pochi edifici che Adrenaline: apartment blocks in Russia and Turkey, Hotels in Mexico and Greece, schools in China and Egypt. Earthquakes in the studied types of traumatic injury followed the normal framework for earthquakes: broken limbs, trauma to the skull, back and chest injuries, lacerations, crushing injuries, burns. However, the proportion of people seriously injured in those with minor injuries varied considerably from 2 to 84%. The average ratio between mortality and morbidity showed more regularity, being 1:3,44, a value close to the 1:3 ratio expected from other investigations (PAHO 1981, Alexander 1985).

In some cases, victims were extracted alive from the rubble up to six days after the earthquake; However, as expected, the vast majority of the survivors were rescued within 24 hours of the disaster (see Noji et al 1993). While it was difficult to determine a relationship between the number of collapsed buildings and the number of deaths, some partial data suggest that there may be an average of 10-16 deaths per 100 buildings completely collapsed in the earthquake.

The panic that accompanies the disaster is a complex phenomenon and the definition of which has sparked debate and case studies (see Alexander 1995), it was detected and identified in 14 of about 86 damaging earthquakes that happened during the period studied, while the escape was described in 25 events.

In the three years considered earthquakes repeatedly hit the same places. Thus, 10 earthquakes hit Indonesia (especially in the province of Irian Jaya) 7 China (especially Yunnan Province). On the whole, some two thirds of seismic disasters occurred in Asia, however, and although this figure is high in terms of long-term average (which is 36%), well worth remembering that half of all deaths recorded in earthquakes occurred in China (Coburn and Spence 1992).

This overview of the phenomenology of the recent earthquakes gives us three possible classes. The first leads us to say that the global mitigation efforts should be concentrated where seismic earthquakes repeatedly occur and more devastation. The second, in the period immediately after an earthquake rescue resources should be concentrated in relatively few places and should be made available very quickly so that we can save the lives of people remained under the rubble. The third, that the number of injuries in earthquakes depends very much on the time of day when the earthquake happens (for example, according to the time when it happens, the next big earthquake in the Bay Area of \u200b\u200bSan Francisco Bay could cause damage valued between $ 115 and $ 135 billion, could kill between 2,000 and 6,000 people and can seriously injure victims 8000-18000; Shah 1995). Apparently, the seismic disasters that happen at night give less opportunity to react and then they cause a higher mortality, although the earthquakes that hit the metropolitan areas during periods of intense commuting can also be particularly lethal.

Although a particular insight can be drawn from the analysis of a single type of risk, an alternative approach is to study all the risks of natural disasters that afflict a particular region. This gives an idea of \u200b\u200bthe "hazard of place" (Hewitt and Burton 1971), the overall risk borne by local residents and the magnitude of the problem faced by the civil authorities to mitigate. Therefore, the section that follows will consider the nature of risk in contemporary global e valuterà la qualità della risposta istituzionale per quanto riguarda la sua evoluzione negli anni recenti.

Il rischio di calamità naturale in Italia

Con un carico sempre minacciante di terremoti, alluvioni, frane, eruzioni vulcaniche, trombe d'aria, maremoti e incendi boschivi, l'Italia denuncia il rischio di calamità naturale più elevato di tutti i paesi europei. Un terremoto dannoso avviene in media ogni 2-4,3 anni (Ganse e Nelson 1981) e nel ventesimo secolo almeno 128.000 italiani sono morti nei disastri sismici (Coburn e Spence 1992). Mentre il miglioramento delle tecniche di costruzione edile, soprattutto per quanto riguarda l'impiego del cemento armato, significherà probabilmente that there will in future mortality compared to 29.500 people died in earthquakes in Calabria in 1783-5 or the 90,000 who died in Messina in 1908, the seismic risks remain high. About 70% of the Italian population resides in municipalities classified as seismic, while 32% live in some 2000 municipalities designated high seismic risk (Solberg and Marcellini 1983). In addition, some of the buildings most vulnerable and least protected from seismic measurements are located in seismically active areas, such as the Irpinia, the Abruzzi, the Aspromonte and western Sicily. In addition, long sections of the Italian coast are subject to significant risk, although more unknown, tsunami (Tinti 1991).

Floods and landslides together cause an average of 36 deaths a year, a number that increased to 64 in the Piedmont flood of November 1994, which caused damage of around £ 15 trillion. Land is geologically young, tectonically disturbed, clay and flysch of the Apennines produce damaging landslides around 3,000 per year (one per 54 km2), and these are widely distributed in the 57% of the municipalities that have the hydrogeological (Alexander 1987). However, nothing compares with the Great Ancona landslide of December 1982, which was well in the spontaneous movement of 3.42 sq km of land and left 3,661 people homeless (Growing, 1986). The largest urban landslide Europe was extension of the city of Ancona on a side that showed periodic signs of instability since 1770. The example of Ancona, as several similar cases in the world, shows that there are complex social mechanisms that relentlessly push forward the process of urban development even though the risks are well known. These processes create a vicious cycle of increases in the vulnerability of the site.

Region Campania at least 3 million people are living with the risk of volcanic eruptions (Scandone et al 1993). Approximately 552,000 of these live in 17 municipalities in the circum-Vesuvian. Vesuvius has historically produced at least 40 phases of activity, including a period of periodic eruptions from 1631 to 1904 (Arno et al 1987). About 4,000 people were killed by the eruption of 16 December 1631 in an area that now has 230,000 inhabitants and a population density among the highest in Europe (up to 18,000 people per sq km). While at Mount Etna, the relatively peaceful nature of the eruptions pose greater containment of lava flows and damage limitation (a problem largely solved, but very expensive) to the Vesuvius, the problem is one part of an urban containment, the which threatens to colonize the most recent lava flows, and the other how to evacuate large numbers of people faced with a potentially explosive volcanic activity, with plinian columns, massive ash falls, lava flows and mud (Scandone et al 1993).

policy and practice of civil protection have evolved very slowly and in Italy, as elsewhere, both responded to the stimulus of more extreme events than to the needs defined objectively. Initially, it poses little attention to the problem. Thus, the year after the Florence flood of November 1966, the so-called "bridge laws" gave rise to a relaxation of the system of building permits to allow for a significant increase in construction, and then the buildings at risk from flooding, to over 70% in some parts of the middle valley of the Arno. The need for coordination backed government following the earthquakes of the Friuli 1976 and Irpinia of 1980 led to the founding of the Ministry and the Civil Protection Department in 1982, but the fortunes of these institutions have been very alternate, as the government organizations that we are gradually succeeding have continually changed the political parameters under which they operate. Nevertheless, the national coordination of disaster response is now well established on a permanent basis under the guidance of a skilled and experienced Secretary, while a 1992 law requires the regions and provinces to mitigate future disasters and to establish structures of civil protection. But in this regard, the progress has been unacceptably slow. Few communities have civil defense command centers, a few training courses, non c'è ancora un collegio nazionale di protezione civile, e lo studio dei disastri non appare, in se, in nessun ordinamento universitario italiano. In questo aspetto l'Italia è molto arretrata rispetto a diversi altri paesi industriali ed alcuni in via di sviluppo, un discreto numero dei quali già offrono lauree e corsi di specializzazione nello studio dei disastri e nella gestione delle emergenze.

Malgrado la lentezza del cambiamento istituzionale, e l'alto grado di inerzia burocratica, l'Italia è ricca di risorse umane e questi sono relativamente ben organizzate. Le associazioni di volontari svolgono un ruolo fondamentale durante le emergenze e sono particolarmente ben sviluppate nelle aree del nord e del centro che hanno sofferto major disasters, like Friuli and Tuscany. Municipalities, like Florence, who have made a substantial progress in setting up a structure of civil protection, have well-integrated units of volunteers operating establishment plan.

Having considered the overall problem of vulnerability in the developed and developing countries, and also having considered the vulnerability in the context of a single risk, earthquakes, and a single country, Italy, is now the time to A summary and consider the future of disaster mitigation at the threshold of the twenty-first century.

The way of the future

From the world public, political and scientific interest in disaster Natural has never been more alive than the present. The willingness to lower the risks, or simply need to provide relief, governments and non-governmental organizations have become increasingly involved in the fight to prevent accidents and reduce losses in natural disasters. However, these efforts have become highly polarized. The industrialized world has invested substantially in technological solutions to the problem of natural hazards, using new systems for monitoring and early warning and defense systems, structural designing expensive. In contrast, the developing world is forced to depend more on human resource management, often in a complex situation political instability, social, military and environmental (Varley 1993). So far, there have been few signs of a major process of transfer of technology or a special willingness of the developed world to share with countries in developing its sophisticated monitoring and early warning systems (Hays and Pouhban 1991).

One wonders if the world is able to maintain its current level of interest in disasters and, especially, if it is able to translate this interest in a better level of mitigation. In industrialized countries, the overwhelming increase in the value and vulnerability of the properties of future losses that will likely stimulate further efforts in the field mitigation (Berz 1994). For example, the scenario of a repeat of the 1923 earthquake in Tokyo (Shah 1995) provides an economic loss of U.S. $ 2000 to 2700 trillion, equivalent to 50% of PLN giaponnese (plus there would be 40,000 to 60,000 deaths ). If this happens, the entire world economy will feel the impact (the data were, however, strongly contested, see Wiggins 1996). Oddly, despite the fact that the mitigation is almost always less costosd prevention of injury, the analysis of cost: benefit are extremely rare in the field of disasters, so it is often very difficult to convince governments to invest public money in preventive measures of the benefits are not immediately apparent.

For developing countries, the 21 major donor nations have increased their share of humanitarian aid nearly six times from 1985 to 1994 (at an annual total of U.S. $ 3.47 billion). In 1995 alone, the World Red Cross has launched emergency appeals 55 (9 of them only to help with natural disasters) that were donating a total of $ 270 million. Disaster Relief is therefore also a big economic deal. However, the boom in aid that followed the end of the Cold War seems to be over, despite the continuing evidence of high levels of need by the countries receiving the aid. Given the increasing awareness to use funds more efficiently, is paying particular attention to the issue of how to integrate the help with mitigation and economic development of regions affected by disasters (Varley 1993). In this, there is a need, not only to enhance the transfer of technology, knowledge and training programs, but also to learn from the events of the Third World. The value of this has been amply demonstrated, for example, interest on the part of Italian volcanologists nell'eruzione of September 1994 the caldera of Rabaul in Papua New Guinea. This event offered a very similar scenario to the possible mechanisms of eruption of the Campi Flegrei Pozzuoli (IAVCEI 1957, Smithsonian Institution, 1994). Cases like this demonstrate that the key to riduzione della vulnerabilità ai disastri risiede nel condividere la tecnologia e la saggezza, ma anche nella migliore gestione delle emergenze come fenomeni sociali che richiedono un'organizzazione innovativa.

In sintesi, i disastri naturali possono essere caratterizzati come una serie di concetti che si innestano, o come fenomeni opposti, o con un grado di complementarità. Possiamo concepirli come una specie di "DNA del disastro" da essere decodificato e spiegato dalla ricerca futura. In questo schema, il tempo è la spina dorsale delle catastrofi, intorno al quale gli eventi si svolgono, mentre lo spazio geografico è il medium di espressione di tali eventi (Alexander 1993b). Ogni nuova catastrofe crea una miscela di elementi unici e irripetibili e di regolarità prevedibili, e quindi essa viene caratterizzata sia dalla casualità che dall'inevitabilità, e viene rappresentata anche da una miscela di pericolo generalizzato e di rischio specifico. La tecnologia viene applicata alla mitigazione (sebbene la sua proliferazione rappresenta anche una fonte di vulnerabilità in sé), ma viene moderata da un filtro culturale, tramite il quale essa viene interpretata, percepita e quindi utilizzata. Come risultato, esiste una tensione costante tra l'amplificazione e la mitigazione del rischio, e il bilancio tra questi fattori determina la vulnerabilità complessiva e l'entità delle perdite future. La risoluzione di questi fattori per particolari rischi e per singoli luoghi pone una notevole sfida agli studiosi dei disastri, ma offre anche la chiave ad una conoscenza più profonda del fenomeno delle calamità naturali.

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Are There Detachable Wheels For Backpacks

future terrorist attacks on the United States, September 11, 2001: The impact on civil protection

The terrorist attacks that occurred on the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001 are unprecedented in scale of operation, the courage and the degree of coordination. It appears that as many as 6 attacks have been planned, of which 3 have hit targets in full, causing the loss of 3000 lives. At the time of writing, it is unclear whether these outrages will be unique in modern history, or they will kick off a new phase of global instability. In any case, the attacks on New York and Washington DC are having a profound impact on civil protection. This article will examine some aspects of the attacks with reference to the organization of emergency planning and emergency response. Although thanks to the media, the events of that terrible day are well known to all, be the first to summarize the sequence of events to better understand what elements are important to the future planning of civil protection.

attacks

At 08:45 on 11 September 2001, during a normal commercial flight, a Boeing 767 is hijacked and driven against the upper floors of the north tower of World Trade Center (WTC) in New York's financial district on the peninsula of Manhattan. Eighteen minutes later another hijacked 767 strikes against the adjacent South Tower. Both towers had 110 floors high. At 10 and 10 minutes a Boeing 757 plunged into the headquarters of the U.S. military, the Pentagon and at the same time another 757 rushes in rural Pennsylvania, apparently missing the target that the hijackers wanted to strike at Washington or in the state of Maryland. At least three other aircraft carrying terrorists armed with knives were in Meanwhile on the ground when stopped groundstop , the next general aviation firm, although the news of their existence was made public only after several days.

The ability of the fuel tanks of the Boeing 767 is 90,770 liters, while that of 757 is 42,680 liters. All four aircraft had taken off with full tanks a few minutes before being hijacked. The 266 people aboard, including the 19 hijackers are killed in the clashes and there are no survivors. In all three buildings affected supplies of aircraft fuel explosion. Fireballs are injected into both towers of the WTC: the northern catches fire between the 951 and the 1031 plan, the south between 821 and 931. The fire at the Pentagon, the largest office building in the world, continues for several hours but was contained by the massive structure of the building, designed to withstand a military attack.

The WTC was built in the 60s, with a structure composed of steel beams covered in concrete. The tower has a strong central column in which there were lifts (198 in all), scales and pipes for the distribution of services. The supporting beams radiating from this central section connecting to the outside with the rest of the casing structure.

impacts and the flames destroy the fire, while the temperature in the upper floors of two buildings saliva rapidamente a circa 800-1100 gradi. Nel giro di un'ora il cemento diventava polvere o fuliggine. Prima le travi deformavano per l'intenso caldo e poi si scioglievano. Sessantadue minuti dopo l'impatto la torre meridionale crolla. Quella settentrionale la segue alle ore 1028, 103 minuti dopo aver subito l'impatto del primo aereo.

Secondo i progettisti, le torri furono costruite in modo tale da resistere l'impatto di un Boeing 707, il normale aereo di linea negli anni '60, e di bloccare lo sviluppo di un incendio per circa 2 ore, il tempo 'di progetto' per l'evacuazione totale delle 2 torri più alte (il World Trade Center consisteva in 7 edifici). Sarebbe stato, comunque, estremamente difficile progettare questi edifici per resistere the impact, the explosion and the fireballs of premeditated and carefully planned attacks like those of September 11.

The overall figure of the dead is estimated to be 44 units in Pennsylvania, 189 in the Pentagon and World Trade Center in 2765, including hundreds of foreigners in the second case from about 60 countries. A few dozen of the victims were Italian. Given that at times of peak times, the WTC housed 40.000 visitors and 80,000 workers, the mortality in New York is reduced by the evacuations, which had, after all, successful. But dozens of people trapped on upper floors with no possibility of rescue by jumping from windows to avoid dying a slow end of the flames.

Of particular importance for civil protection is the death of 343 firefighters and 78 policemen, who rushed to the WTC just after being warned the fighting and, in many cases went up the emergency stairs of the towers with the intention of saving people trapped, or to fight the flames.

The collapse could have been much more devastating impact if the aircraft had taken place, and the resulting fires developed in the lowest points of the towers. Thus, they could fall on the buildings adjacent turning as felled trees, while in fact dropped vertically on a rather narrow. At the beginning of the collapse, the displacement of the load plans higher on the lower ones is about 100,000 tons, and the resulting pile of rubble, which also contains the remains of as many as 3 other buildings (including the WTC-7, a skyscraper of 47 floors), weighs about 1,200 million tonnes. The collapse generated seismic waves of earthquakes comparable to a maximum magnitude of 3.2.

Analysis

While almost all the individual elements of the attacks are comparable to some aspects of previous events (eg, the clash of a fighter plane against the Empire State Building), the sum of the effects, and thus the severity the total impact, has no parallel in the history of terrorism. The magnitude of the attack, the degree of coordination and lack fall outside of notice of any other experience. Therefore, planning before the event could not draw enough inspiration from other events to describe the scenario. Despite this, many lessons can be learned from what happened. Here is a brief reflection on some key issues.

problems in New York

evacuation procedures. For years, the evacuation of tall buildings has been the subject of controversy. The skyscrapers are high levels of vulnerability with regard to the risk of fire or structural failure. Some photographs taken during the evacuation of one of the WTC towers show narrow stairs (of width less than a meter) and crowded with people trying to get down, pinching the walls to pass the firefighters going up, loaded with oxygen tanks and other gear.

Having received conflicting instructions from colleagues, not all the occupants of the towers were going immediately to the outputs, especially those who were still saw the rain of debris from above and that they felt more secure inside and out. Eventually, many of those who reached the stairs were dark, the smoke and the presence of large amounts of water from broken fire suppression systems.

Although a large number of people have managed to evacuate the towers (forse il 90%), molte persone hanno impiegato più di un'ora di arrivare al pianterreno dal 701 piano e oltre. Una volta arrivate, il fumo, la polvere e la pioggia di detriti che cadeva continuamente nella piazza del WTC rendeva molto pericoloso il tentativo di uscire. Più positivamente, come avrebbero previsto i sociologi che si occupano dei disastri, il panico sembra esser stato molto limitato: la stragrande maggioranza delle persone si sono comportate in modo calmo e razionale, anche in situazioni apocalittiche.

Scenari di pianificazione per gli edifici alti. Nei giorni successivi, alcuni esperti di ingegneria strutturale comunicano ai mass media la gravità degli incendi (cioè, pochi minuti dopo l'impatto) realizing that the towers were inevitably collapse. The implications of such statements for the planning of emergency operations are profound. Although underestimate the risk of collapse is understandable under very exceptional circumstances, in New York 248 firefighters and 95 rescuers from 5 districts and 34 companies of the New York Fire Department and then died. Moreover, many means of rescue services are rolled in the double collapse of the towers.

It 's normal to base plans on events more likely and less catastrophic rather than on almost unthinkable with truly apocalyptic consequences. Yet the planning of disaster requires the Apensare @ the unthinkable: it should accustom Disaster Manager to adapt its decisions and actions at the very unusual conditions. Taking into account that there is nothing more cruel and deceitful of hindsight, we must rethink, rather deeply, the management of major disasters that hit the tall buildings. As part of the municipal emergency plans, we must formulate detailed scenarios of response to such situations.

In the United States each year 16,000 to 20,000 tall buildings catch fire, killing between 80 and 90 people and wounding 800-900. Obviously, the problem is not restricted USI: for example, in the 70 Saõ Paulo was the scene of two famous fires in skyscrapers, where dozens of people died trapped. It's not a problem so unusual.

The most significant issue is the safety of emergency workers, the need to speed up the evacuations, and the need to protect the evacuees while leaving the building. The first part of the attached table provides a range of theoretical predictions of time to evacuate the WTC calculated using some nonlinear equations developed in a series of evacuation drills carried out on tall buildings in downtown Toronto in Canada in the 70s. The second part shows the real time of evacuation after the terrorist attack on the WTC in 1993 when a bomb caused a series of fires and the general spread of smoking in both towers. As the data, the total evacuation of these buildings took more than two hours, and maybe more than 3.

emergency management. The emergency management center in the district of Manhattan was to be located in the north tower of the WTC, where the Port Authority of New York-New Jersey had rented a suite of offices on the 21, 141 and 191 planes. The decision to house the main operations center in the WTC was an act of defiance against terrorism following the bomb in '93, and was also a strategic move, given the central role of the WTC in the area of \u200b\u200bhigh finance in New York. Obviously, under the circumstances has become less suitable place overall. From this we can conclude that in complex urban environments as Manhattan would be required that different centers Operating located in protected areas and connected in a network. Each of these should have the ability to become the main center if that were destined to be rendered unusable.

Other aspects of emergency management in New York have had more positive outcomes. Since the end of the peninsula of Manhattan is surrounded by water on three sides, it was pretty easy to cordon off the affected area and control access. The boats evacuated the wounded across the Hudson River to an advanced medical post in Jersey City, on the shore of New Jersey. Despite the slowness of the littoral transport, it was much easier and safer to help the victims as well, at some distance from the smoke and bustle of Manhattan. Of 5284 injured, 7.9% required a hospital stay. The top-level trauma center closest to the site of the disaster reached its quota of patients (about 200) within 2 hours after the disaster, and later the wounded were distributed among 83 of the 170 hospitals and three counties of the 5 Boroughs the metropolitan area of \u200b\u200bNew York.

At 17.00 on 11 September, the ambulance had reached its full strength, but the second wave of casualties, anxiously awaited by doctors and nurses, there was not. Eight hours after the onset of the disaster there was no need to practice triage.

Search and Rescue. At the site of the New York disaster billion and 200 million tons of debris had accumulated in a tangle very compact but quite unstable. It was extremely difficult to penetrate this to find people trapped, and most importantly, fires broke out all the time. The voids were filled with dust, mud or fire and the surrounding buildings threatened to collapse at any moment (in fact, the WTC-7, 47-story, fell to 17.20 on the same day of the tragedy). Despite search and rescue operation involving up to 1,200 rescue workers at a time (the maximum number that could work in space available), very few people were found alive, and those only at the beginning of the rescue operation. The enormous weight of

collapsed buildings, and excessive fragmentation took place during the collapses, meant that the proportion of voids was less than the figure of 15% found in other big collapses of buildings, such as in earthquakes. The scale of the massive accumulation and instability of the site required the use of heavy vehicles of the types that are usually not used in such circumstances for fear of crushing the victims still alive but trapped under the rubble. In addition, the precariousness of the site required a series of interruptions to the work of rescue workers were struggling while desperately to consolidate the walls still standing. However, with the passage of time, work became more regular and, by dividing the site into 4 zones of control, well 90.000 tonnellate di macerie furono rimosse durante la prima settimana.

Problemi a Washington, D.C.

Un commento editoriale pubblicato nell'autorevole quotidiano The Washington Post una settimana dopo la catastrofe disse che "un esame degli eventi di Martedì scorso indica che il Distretto [Washington DC] era impreparato per l'emergenza e quindi non fu in grado di reagire e prestare assistenza al pubblico in modo rapido e efficace." Questa affermazione è grave tale da richiedere chiarimenti e spiegazioni.

Le comunicazioni e le risposte di emergenza. Gli Stati Uniti dispongono di un sistema di trasmissione di messaggi di emergenza al pubblico tramite radio and television that is regularly put to the test. On the morning of the disaster this tool was not activated in the District of Columbia. Nevertheless, the majority of citizens obtained information on what to do by the same media who would forward messages from the government, but the interpretations of the situation made and received from journalists are not necessarily the official ones. In fact, in some cases it appears that an official policy of the emergency was not there. For example, the head of the Office of the Mayor, unable to communicate by telephone because of the overhead lines and cellular networks, used the mail to order the evacuation of federal agencies. But four minutes after the Chief countermand the city sent, again via email. The first message was sent in response to information, proved wrong, that three other planes were to fall on the capital and the second was the result of a decision not to suspend the operation of government during the crisis.

Aside from the obvious conclusion that e-mail is not a good way to spread an evacuation order, but the Internet was slowed down by overloaded and therefore lost its ability to transmit messages in real time. In any case, in fact non-essential workers were returning home on their own, creating smooth road all over the District of Columbia and blocking the movement of emergency vehicles. A traffic management system (the result of planning 'Year 2000', called 'Y2K') was activated after 3 hours esole managed to loosen congestion.

According to the forecasts for any emergency, some satellite phones should be placed in key government officials in Washington. Unfortunately, these tools have remained closed in a closet until the next day. In addition, the Local Health District did not have radios capable of monitoring communications between hospitals and ambulances, and then, given the non-functioning of telephones, was not able to participate in the formulation of logistical decisions and to estimate the availability of health services.

emergency plans. The Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia, which has a workforce of 3800 employees, guarded or not a plan anti-terrorist nor a procedure to inform the police and their commanders on the road where and how to respond to the crisis. The commanders were forced to improvise a plan to the minute. The police was not aware of the decision taken by the federal government to send its employees home, and then was caught by surprise by the influx of traffic on the roads.

Meanwhile, the houses of Parliament were not evacuated. Was it better that way, since deputies and senators were not trained in the evacuation and the plan was not updated regarding the location of emergency exits of the building. Although he feared an attack right at the Capitol.

On the other hand, however, the Metropolitan Washington immediately put in place its emergency plan and continued to function well throughout the crisis. Unfortunately, many commuters took that was not in operation and tried to return home on the roads, so the trains circulating half empty.

Arlington County, peripheral to the city, launched its emergency plan 10 minutes after the start of the crisis. Luckily, however, that there were not many casualties, because the administration of the city of Washington declared that the Washington Hospital Center, the main center trauma in the area, could not accommodate a large number of victims.

Conclusion. When the Secret Service realized that a third plane was heading to the White House (and then with a sudden change at the Pentagon), did not have a procedure to bring it down and at the fighters would have to cover 200 km before arriving in Washington. But apart from such a drastic measure as hypothetical and killing, was abundantly clear that the magnitude of a possible terrorist attack on the U.S. capital was widely underestimated in the plans, if there were. The scenarios were too modest, particularly about the likely level of chaos, and the existing plans were neither comprehensive nor sufficiently clear about the likely risks. In fact, an emergency simulation carried out during the month of June 2001 provided for a chemical attack in the open air in front of the Smithsonian National Museum, no damage and few casualties.

addition, the Civil Protection Agency of the City of Washington had neither the funds nor the manpower to break in and create a contingency plan for the size you need. Following the crisis, its parent organization, FEMA, churches (and usually won) $ 250 million a week to carry out relief work: infinitely superior to those amounts that were requested (and obtained) to finance the planning before the attacks.

According to the consensus that prevailed before Sept. 11, the city needed to plan well coded but largely generic, such as the piano 'ThreatCon' ( Conditions threatening, that is, threatening conditions) of the U.S. military, which lists operations to perform a series of alert levels. The ThreatCon worked pretty well during emergencies in New York and Washington, but as a tool to deal with such disasters was not enough.

Conclusion

If the terrorist outrages of 11 September 2001 will remain a rather unique series of events in history, or into a new era of attacks, not yet known. The events of that day took place in the middle of town so rich in resources and sources of assistance are not missed. If anything, the opposite of congestion and the reactions of convergence towards the site of the attack were a major problem. As a necessary consequence, the measures were necessary to quell the confusion drastic. In this sense, terrorism leads, inevitably, a more authoritarian than other forms of disaster, with the exception of the war itself. Emergency planners need to better address this issue in order to incorporate a structure of civil protection in response to terrorism dominated by police and military forces.

Problems medici, psicologici, economici e strategici causati dal disastro andranno avanti per anni, con impatti profondi, non soltanto sulle famiglie delle vittime e sulle prospettive per la pace a livello mondiale, ma anche sulla comunità della Protezione civile statunitense. Si spera, comunque, che gli eventi di quel terribile giorno, e tutto il suo seguito domestico e internazionale, stimoleranno un miglioramento della pianificazione di emergenza, con 'regole di combattimento' più precise e scenari di risposta più dettagliati e accurati. Creare questi strumenti è considerato un obbligo da molti operatori nel settore che vogliono rendere omaggio ai coraggiosi soccorritori che hanno perso la vita nel cuore di Manhattan.

Tabella n. 1. Tempi di evacuazione della World Trade Center, New York

Tempi teorici di evacuazione
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Pauls (1980) equazione di flusso medio

10.000 persone per scala ' 2 ore 14 minuti per uscire
20.000 persone per scala ' 2 ore 41 minuti per uscire
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Pauls e Jones (1980) equazione per il tempo totale di evacuazione

10.000 persone per scala ' 1 ore 59 minuti
20.000 persone per scala ' 3 ore 56 minuti
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Tempi misurati di evacuazione

Quenemoen et alii (1996) following the bomb and escape the fire of 1993

Short evacuation for 161 people:
48% less than 60 minutes
27% between 60 and 120 minutes
25% more than 120 minutes

September 11, 2001, the collapse of the towers 62 and the evacuations ended 103 minutes after the start of the crisis, with about 90% of people evacuated. ___________________________________________________________________

Works Cited:

Pauls, JL 1980. Building evacuation Research Findings and recommendations. In D. Canter (editor) Fires and Human Behavior . John Wiley & Son, New York.

Pauls, JL and Jones BK 1980. Building evacuation: research methods and case studies. In D. Canter (editor) Fires and Human Behavior . John Wiley & Son, New York.

Quenemoen, LE, Ym Davia, J. Malilay, T. Sinks, and S. Noji Ek Klitzman 1996. The World Trade Center bombing: injury prevention strategies for high-rise buildings. Disasters 20 (2): 125-132.