Questions Answers

Hazard Disaster

Hazard is a threat. A hazard A Disaster is an event. It is a

is a dangerous physical calamity or tragedy or a
condition or event. consequence of a hazard.
Natural hazards that cause
great loss to human life and
the economy are called
disasters and catastrophes. A
disaster disrupts the normal
function of society.

A threat that can be An international danger and

managed by observing threat to humanity that
warning signs and keeping in needs intervention to bring
harmony with the the situation under control.
1. What is the difference between environment.
disaster and hazard?
Earthquakes, floods, volcanic It causes damage to property
eruptions, landslides, and loss of life but it also
droughts, etc. are called disrupts employment
natural hazards before they opportunities.
cause great loss of life and
damage to property.

A small number of people are A large number of people are

affected. affected.

It may cause injury, loss of It causes widespread loss to

life, or damage to property. life and property.

Hazards can lead to A disaster is the result of a

disasters. hazard but at the same time
is also a hazardous event.

Levels of Disasters:
● Level-L1: The level of disaster that can be managed
2. What are the levels of disaster? within the capabilities and resources at the District
level. However, the state authorities will remain in
readiness to assist if needed;

The widely accepted classification system used by the
Disaster
DesInventar classifies disasters arising from natural hazards
into five major categories:
3. What is a natural disaster?
● Level-L2: This signifies the disaster situations that
require assistance and active mobilization of resources
at the state level and deployment of state-level
agencies for disaster management. The central agencies
must remain vigilant for immediate deployment if
required by the state, and
● Level-L3: This corresponds to a nearly catastrophic
situation or a very large-scale disaster that overwhelms
the State and District authorities.
Information Management System of
● Geophysical: Geological process or phenomenon that
may cause loss of life, injury or other health impacts,
property damage, loss of livelihoods and services, social
and economic disruption, or environmental damage.
Hydro-meteorological factors are important contributors
to some of these processes. Tsunamis are difficult to
categorize; although they are triggered by undersea
earthquakes, and other geological events, they are
essentially an oceanic process that is manifested as a
coastal water-related hazard. Examples- Earthquake/
Mass movement of earth materials, volcano,
tsunami.
● Hydrological: Events caused by deviations in the
normal water cycle and/or overflow of bodies of water
caused by wind set-up. Examples- Flood, Landslides,
Wave Actions.
● Meteorological: Events caused by short-lived/small to
mesoscale atmospheric processes (in the spectrum from
minutes to days). Examples- Cyclone, Storm Surge,
Tornado, Convective storms, Cold-Wave,
Heatwaves, etc.
● Climatological: Events caused by long-lived meso-to
macro-scale processes (in the spectrum from
intra-seasonal to multi-decadal climate variability).
Examples- Drought, Extreme hot/cold conditions,
Forest Fires, etc.
● Biological: Process or phenomenon of organic origin or
conveyed by biological vectors, including exposure to
pathogenic microorganisms, toxins, and bioactive
 substances that may cause loss of life, injury, illness or
other health impacts, property damage, loss of
livelihoods and services, social and economic disruption,
or environmental damage. Examples- Epidemics,
Insect infestations.

● Man-made disasters have an element of human

intent, negligence, or error involving a failure of a
man-made system, as opposed to natural disasters
resulting from natural hazards.
● It is noted that the rise in population, rapid
urbanization and industrialization, development
within high-risk zones, environmental
degradation, and climate change aggravate the
vulnerabilities to various kinds of disasters.
4. What is a Man-made disaster?
● Due to inadequate disaster preparedness,
communities, and animals are at increased risk from
many kinds of human-induced hazards arising from
accidents (industrial, road, air, rail, on river or sea,
building collapse, fires, mine flooding, urban flooding,
oil spills, etc.).
● Terrorist activities and crimes arising from
intentional or unintentional activities also add to these
risks and call for adequate preparedness and planning.

● Vulnerability refers to the propensity of exposed

elements such as human beings, their livelihoods,
and assets to suffer adverse effects when
impacted by hazard events.
● The vulnerability is related to predisposition,
susceptibilities, fragilities, weaknesses,
deficiencies, or lack of capacities that favor adverse
effects on the exposed elements.
● The vulnerability functions estimate the damage ratio
and consequent loss respectively, and/or the social cost
5. What is vulnerability to hazards? (e.g., number of injured, homeless, and killed)
generated by a hazard, according to a specified
exposure.
● Vulnerability describes a set of conditions of people
that derive from the historical and prevailing
cultural, social, environmental, political, and
economic contexts. In this sense, vulnerable groups
are not only at risk because they are exposed to a
hazard but as a result of marginality, everyday patterns
of social interaction and organization, and access to
 resources.
● Thus, the effects of a disaster on any particular
household result from a complex set of drivers and
interacting conditions.
● Key causes of vulnerability are Economic factors,
Social factors, Political factors, Environmental
factors.
● High vulnerability and exposure are generally the
outcome of skewed development processes, such
as those associated with environmental
mismanagement, demographic changes, rapid and
unplanned urbanization in hazardous areas, failed
governance, and the scarcity of livelihood options
for the poor.

● Disasters are sometimes considered external shocks,

but disaster risk results from the complex
interaction between development processes that
generate conditions of exposure, vulnerability,
and hazard.
● Disaster risk is therefore considered as the
combination of the severity and frequency of a
hazard, the numbers of people and assets
exposed to the hazard, and their vulnerability to
damage.
● Intensive risk is disaster risk associated with
low-probability, high-impact events, whereas extensive
risk is associated with high-probability, low-impact
events.
● Disaster risk = Hazard X Vulnerability
6. What are disaster risk and its
characteristics?
Characteristics of Disaster Risk are the following:
● Forward-looking at the likelihood of loss of life,
destruction, and damage in a given period of time.
● Dynamic: It can increase or decrease according to our
ability to reduce vulnerability.
● Invisible: It consists of not only the threat of
high-impact events but also the frequent, low-impact
events that are often hidden.
● Unevenly distributed around the earth: Hazards
affect different areas, but the pattern of disaster risk
reflects the social construction of exposure and
vulnerability in different countries.
● Emergent and complex: Many processes, including
climate change and globalized economic development,
are creating new, interconnected risks.
 ● Risk is the chance or probability that a person will
be harmed or experience an adverse health effect
if exposed to a hazard. It may also apply to situations
with property or equipment loss, or harmful effects on
the environment.
For example, the risk of developing cancer from smoking
cigarettes could be expressed as:
● "Cigarette smokers are 12 times (for example) more
likely to die of lung cancer than non-smokers", or
● "the number per 100,000 smokers who will develop
lung cancer" (actual number depends on factors such as
their age and how many years they have been
smoking).
7. What do you mean by risk? ● These risks are expressed as a probability or likelihood
of developing a disease or getting injured, whereas
hazard refers to the agent responsible (i.e. smoking).
Factors that influence the degree or likelihood of risk
are:
● The nature of the exposure: how much a person is
exposed to a hazardous thing or condition (e.g., several
times a day or once a year),
● How the person is exposed (e.g., breathing in a vapor,
skin contact), and
● The severity of the effect. For example, one substance
may cause skin cancer, while another may cause skin
irritation. Cancer is a much more serious effect than an
irritation.

● Risk assessments are produced to estimate possible

economic, infrastructure, and social impacts arising
from a particular hazard or multiple hazards.
● The disaster risk can be measured by analyzing
trends of, for instance, previous disaster losses.
● A comprehensive risk assessment considers the full
range of potential disaster events and their underlying
drivers and uncertainties.
● It can start with the analysis of historical events as
8. How is the disaster risk assessed? well as incorporating forward-looking
perspectives, integrating the anticipated impacts
of phenomena that are altering historical trends, such
as climate change.
● Besides, risk assessment may consider rare events
that lie outside projections of future hazards but that,
based on scientific knowledge, could occur.
● Data on hazards, exposures, vulnerabilities, and losses
enhance the accuracy of risk assessment, contributing
to more effective measures to prevent, prepare for, and
 financially manage disaster risk.
● Modern approaches to risk assessment include risk
modeling. Risk models allow us to simulate the
outcomes and likelihood of different events.
● The components of assessing risk (and the associated
losses) include hazard, exposure, vulnerability.

● The understanding of disaster risk integrates into it

numerous actions needed for strengthening disaster
resilience.
● The major themes for action are:
○ Observation Networks, Information Systems,
Research, Forecasting,
○ Zoning / Mapping,
9. What are the methods used for ○ Monitoring and Warning Systems,
understanding the risk and ○ Hazard Risk and Vulnerability Assessment
improving the risk resilience? (HRVA), and
○ Dissemination of Warnings, Data, and
Information.
● Having adequate systems to provide warnings,
disseminate information, and carry out meaningful
monitoring of hazards are crucial to disaster risk
reduction, and improving resilience. They are also an
integral part of improving the understanding of risk.

● Social vulnerability refers to the potential impacts of

hazardous events on groups such as the poor,
single-parent households, pregnant or lactating women,
the handicapped, children, and the elderly.
10. What is Social vulnerability?
● Social factors like poverty and inequality,
marginalization, social exclusion, and discrimination by
gender, social status, disability, and age cause social
vulnerability.

Prime Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi, enunciated a Ten-Point

Agenda in his speech at the Asian Ministerial Conference
on Disaster Risk Reduction 2016. The ten key elements
consist of the following:
1. All development sectors must imbibe the principles of
disaster risk management.
11. What is the Ten-Point Agenda for
2. Risk coverage must include all, starting from poor
Disaster Risk Reduction?
households to SMEs to multinational Corporations to
nation-states.
3. Women’s leadership and greater involvement should be
central to disaster risk management.
4. Invest in risk mapping globally to improve global
understanding of Nature and disaster risks.
 5. Leverage technology to enhance the efficiency of
disaster risk management efforts.
6. Develop a network of universities to work on
disaster-related issues.
7. Utilize the opportunities provided by social media and
mobile technologies for disaster risk reduction.
8. Build on local capacity and initiative to enhance disaster
risk reduction.
9. Make use of every opportunity to learn from disasters
and, to achieve that, there must be studies on the
lessons after every disaster.
10. Bring about greater cohesion in the international
response to disasters.

The Disaster Management Act of 2005 defines Disaster

Management as an integrated process of planning, organizing,
coordinating, and implementing measures that are necessary
for:
● Prevention of the threat of any disaster;
12. What is Disaster Management? ● Reduction of risk of any disaster or its consequences;
● Readiness to deal with any disaster;
● Promptness in dealing with a disaster;
● Assessing the severity of the effects of any disaster;
● Rescue and relief;
● Rehabilitation and Reconstruction.

● Disaster Mitigation is the cornerstone of

emergency management. The lessening or
minimizing of the adverse impacts of a hazardous
event.
● It’s the ongoing effort to lessen the impact disasters
have on people and property.
● Mitigation involves keeping homes away from
floodplains, engineering bridges to withstand
earthquakes, creating and enforcing effective building
codes to protect property from hurricanes, and more.
13. What is mitigation in disaster
● Through the application of mitigation technologies and
management?
practices, our society can ensure fewer victims of
natural disasters. For example, mitigation measures
can be applied to strengthen your home, so that
your family and belongings are better protected
from floods, earthquakes, cyclones, and other
natural hazards. They can be utilized to help
businesses and industry to avoid damage to their
facilities and remain operational in the face of disaster.
● Mitigation technologies can be used to strengthen
hospitals, fire stations, and other critical service
 facilities so that they can remain operational or reopen
more quickly after an event.
● Mitigation measures can help reduce disaster losses and
suffering so that there is less demand for money and
resources in the aftermath.

● Disaster preparedness refers to measures taken to

14. What is disaster preparedness?
● The knowledge and capacities of governments,
prepare for and reduce the effects of disasters. That is,
to predict and, where possible, prevent disasters,
mitigate their impact on vulnerable populations, and
respond to and effectively cope with their
consequences.
professional response and recovery organizations,
communities, and individuals to effectively anticipate,
respond to, and recover from the impacts of likely,
imminent, or current disasters.

● The response phase occurs in the immediate aftermath

of a disaster. During the response phase, business and
other operations do not function normally.
● Personal safety and wellbeing in an emergency and the
duration of the response phase depend on the level of
preparedness.
● The response addresses immediate threats presented
by the disaster, including saving lives, meeting
15. Write a short note on disaster
humanitarian needs (food, shelter, clothing, public
management during the disaster
health, and safety), cleanup, damage assessment, and
phase.
the start of resource distribution.
● During the disaster, Search and rescue and Relief.
● Examples of response activities include:
○ Implementing disaster response plans.
○ Conducting search and rescue missions.
○ Take actions to protect yourself, your family, your
animals, and others.
○ Addressing public concerns.

● Disaster recovery is a very significant stage in the

disaster management cycle, as this is when the support
of governmental and non-governmental agencies in the
disaster aftermath usually starts receding and the
16. What are rehabilitation and
affected community has to fend for itself.
reconstruction?
● At this stage, the role of the community and self-help
groups becomes paramount since they can make or mar
the crucial link between disaster response and disaster
recovery.
● The disaster recovery stage in the disaster management
cycle falls between the disaster response phase and the
overall development phase.
● Rehabilitation and reconstruction operations are integral
to disaster recovery.
● They provide a direct ‘connect’ between disaster
response and long-term development.
● The two activities, however, do not have a similar
connotation.
● Rehabilitation-
○ Rehabilitation involves restoring local services
related to the provision of immediate needs.
○ It implies a systematic return to pre-disaster
status.
○ It refers to actions taken in the aftermath of a
disaster to enable basic services to resume
functioning, assist victims’ self-help efforts to
repair physical damage, restore community
facilities, revive economic activities and provide
support for the psychological and social
well-being of the survivors.
○ It focuses on enabling the affected population to
resume more or less normal patterns of life.
○ It may be considered as a transitional phase
between immediate relief and major long-term
development.
● Reconstruction-
○ Reconstruction represents long-term
development assistance, which could help people
in the affected areas to rebuild their lives and
meet their present and future needs.
○ It takes into account the reduction of future
disaster risks.
○ Rehabilitation may not necessarily restore the
damaged structures and resources in their
previous form or location.
○ It may include the replacement of temporary
arrangements established as part of emergency
response or the up-gradation of infrastructure
and systems from pre-disaster status.
● For instance, following a damaging cyclone, the
rehabilitation of the power lines would aim to restore
the system as rapidly as possible so that the essential
services would continue to function, whereas,
reconstruction of the power lines would aim to rebuild
the rehabilitated system to a higher or safer standard

17. Explain contingency planning.
The objectives of the NDMP are listed below:
18. What are the objectives of the
National Disaster Management
Policy?
than before so that the future risks to the power lines
from a similar damaging event could be reduced.
● Reconstruction must be fully integrated into long-term
developmental plans, taking into account future disaster
risks and possibilities to reduce them by incorporating
appropriate measures.
● A contingency plan is a partial process of disaster
preparedness planning.
● Contingency plans focus on events or risks, such as
earthquakes or floods, at a local, national, or regional
level. The plans include operational concepts and
resource assessments, amongst other things.
● Plans can help ensure timely and effective provision of
humanitarian aid to those most in need when a disaster
occurs.
● Time spent in contingency planning equals time saved
when a disaster occurs. Effective contingency planning
should lead to timely and effective disaster-relief
operations.
● The contingency planning process can be broken down
into three simple questions:
a. What is going to happen?
b. What are we going to do about it?
c. What can we do ahead of time to get prepared?
● To improve understanding of disaster risk,
vulnerabilities, and hazards.
● To strengthen the governance of disaster risk at
every level, i.e., from national to local.
● To invest in the reduction of disaster risk for
resilience by means of structural, non-structural, and
financial measures, and also by comprehensive
capacity development.
● To improve disaster preparedness for effective
response.
● To encourage ‘Build Back Better’ in recovery,
reconstruction, and rehabilitation.
● To prevent disasters and ensure a significant decrease
in the disaster risk and loss of life, livelihood, health,
and assets including physical, economic, cultural,
social, and environmental assets.
● Enhance resilience and check new disasters from
emerging and reduce existing ones.
 ● To promote the execution of inclusive and integrated
structural, economic, social, legal, health, cultural,
environmental, educational, political, technological,
and institutional measures to reduce and prevent
hazard exposure and vulnerabilities to disasters.
● To empower communities as well as local authorities
to manage and decrease disaster risks.
● To bolster technical and scientific capabilities in all
areas of disaster management.
● To develop capacity at every level to effectively
respond to multiple hazards and for community-based
management of disaster.
● To offer clarity on the responsibilities and roles of the
various departments and ministries involved.
● To foster a culture of disaster risk mitigation and
prevention at all levels.
● To enable the mainstreaming of disaster management
concerns into planning.

● These indicators reflect the organizational,

19. What is a Disaster Risk Index?
● India has its own Disaster Risk called the National
development, capacity, and institutional actions taken to
reduce vulnerability and losses in a given area, to
prepare for a crisis, and to recover efficiently from
disasters. This index is designed to assess risk
management performance.
Disaster Risk Index. The National Disaster Risk Index
world maps hazards and vulnerabilities including
economic vulnerabilities across 640 districts and all
states including UTs.