A national system for disseminating information on victims during mass casualty incidents

Immediate provision of information to the public is vital during mass casualty incidents (MCIs). Failure to implement rapidly a communication response system may result in the public overwhelming hospitals. This paper shares Israel's experience in developing and maintaining a national system for supplying information on the location and identification of casualties. ADAM interfaces online with hospitals' patient registration systems, and allows for immediate electronic transfer of designated data. The system permits information centres to access information on which hospital has admitted identified and unidentified casualties. The latter are photographed at the entrance to the hospital and the picture is stored in ADAM. The system enables hospitals and municipalities to ensure immediate availability and accessibility of information and thus (in our belief) mitigate the concerns of family and friends. Use of such an interface system is recommended as an integral element of emergency preparedness.     

Advanced rescue techniques: lessons learned from the collapse of a building in Nairobi, Kenya

This paper examines the collapse of a five-storey building in Nairobi, Kenya, on 23 January 2006. It draws on reports from local authorities and on debriefings by Israel's Home Front Command (HFC), including information on injury distribution, rescue techniques, and the mode of operation. Most of the 117 people found under the structure were evacuated on the first day to a public hospital, which was overwhelmed by the incident. HFC forces arrived 23 hours after the disaster. At that stage, two people were still buried under the building and special techniques (tunnelling and scalping) were required to secure their evacuation. The two people quickly recovered after a short stay in hospital. Local technology is the preferred option during such events because time is crucial. International cooperation is required when this technology is not available. All of the hospitals in the disaster area, including private facilities, should participate in treating casualties.     

Casualty treatment after earthquake disasters: development of a regional simulation model

This paper presents a new approach to the casualty treatment problem following a large-scale disaster, based on a mathematical model of how a regional health-care system responds to an earthquake event. The numbers and locations of casualties rescued alive, the scale of pre-hospital care, the post-earthquake hospital capacity, and the transport system are inputs to the model. The model simulates the movement of casualties from the stricken areas to hospitals. It predicts the number of casualties that die as well as other statistics about the health-care system response, such as waiting time before treatment. The model can be run with varying input assumptions to simulate alternative disaster response strategies. Preliminary runs demonstrate the potential of the model as a tool for planning and training.     

The increasing exposure of cities to the effects of volcanic eruptions: a global survey

Abstract

The most dynamic demographic process of the past 250 years has been the movement of people from rural areas to cities. For most of this period urbanisation has been concentrated in economically more developed parts of the world, but during the last 50 years the focus has shifted to economically less developed regions. Urbanisation, particularly in developing countries, has led to increasing global exposure to a variety of natural hazards, not the least of which are risks posed to large cities by volcanoes. In this paper we monitor these demographic changes and detail the various types of volcanic hazard to which cities are exposed. A major eruption affecting a city in a developing country could cause widespread loss of life and regional disruption. Effective response, however, might minimise casualties in a city within a developed nation affected by a major eruption, but the economic impact could have global consequences. We argue that global hazard exposure is often subtle and involves not only the size of a city and the types of volcanic product that may occur, but also the strategic position of the threatened city within the economy of a country and/or region and the fact that volcano-induced tsunami and other consequences of eruptions, such as climatic change, may affect cities far removed from a given eruption site. Mitigation measures informed by both specifc prediction (surveillance) and general prediction (hazard mapping) are providing the potential to reduce hazard exposure. The paper concludes with a consideration of ongoing research, in particular the emphasis currently being placed on conflating hazard analysis with studies of place, economy, society and culture.     

中山市城区避震疏散场所规划

当地震来临时,快速及时地将人员疏散到安全地带,能大大减少人员伤亡。因此,在地震频发、城市人口不断集中的今天,各城市应事先建设好避震疏散场所。通过对影响避震疏散场所选择的中山市城区地质构造背景与场地条件、以区为单位需安置人口数量、医疗救护点、易燃易爆危险源、避震疏散通道分布等要素的分析,并在野外勘查的基础上,参照关于建设避震疏散场所的规范和标准,对中山市城区避震疏散场所进行了规划。所规划的避震疏散场所安全可靠、布局合理,能够满足中山市城区的应急疏散需要。     

地震损失的预测方法

地震损失预测是一项涉及多种学科的综合性分析。本文给出一种分析方法,可用来确定当城市遭遇一定地震烈度时的可能损失和年平均损失期望值。文中叙述了建筑结构、生命线工程等各类损失预测方法,以及由此引起的间接损失问题,并给出估算人员伤亡的经验公式。最后,用本文方法预测安阳市在遭遇Ⅷ-Ⅸ度地震影响时的经济损失和人员伤亡数,为编制安阳市抗震防灾规划提供了依据。     

基于GIS的城市火灾风险评价及其在防灾规划中的应用

随着经济发展和城市化进程的不断加快,城市火灾事故不断增多,造成的人员伤亡和财产损失也越来越严重。本文通过构建城市火灾风险评价指标体系,利用GIS中的空间分析功能对各指标体系按其权重进行叠加,得出城市的现状火灾风险等级区划图。根据风险评价现状确定防灾减灾规划的目标,采取相应的防灾减灾措施,并对规划后的火灾风险状况进行了预测,得出规划后的火灾风险等级,从而为消防和规划部门减少和预防城市火灾提供依据和参考。     

汶川地震典型民居震害特征分析

汶川"5.12"Ms8.0级特大地震造成了巨大的经济损失和人员伤亡。大量的民居房屋遭到了破坏。针对汶川地震灾区典型民居结构——砖混结构和底框架结构,通过震害描述介绍了其破坏形式,并按构件从基础到屋面依次分析了震害特征及结构破坏机理。最后对民居房屋建筑的建设提出了设计与施工方面的建议。     

重庆市的洪涝灾害管理

洪涝灾害是重庆市主要自然灾害之一,每年带来巨大的经济损失和人员伤亡,严重制约着重庆市社会、经济的可持续发展.本文在大量研究的基础上,分析了重庆市洪涝灾害的特点,总结了历年来的洪涝灾害及造成的损失,最后针对洪涝灾害的特点提出建立重庆市洪涝灾害管理系统,并对该系统作了详细分析.     

A multi-hospital system for disaster situations*

From a review of the literature, it can be concluded that it is always advantageous and usually necessary to distribute the casualties of a disaster to several hosp-hospitals rather than allowing 1 hospital, the nearest to the scene, to bear the whole load. The potential of these hospitals would be enhanced if their preparedness and planning included anticipation of their functioning as part of a framework of the entire capacity of the medical services of an entire small country, or a region of a larger one. For the smooth functioning of this framework, central co-ordination and control of the distribution of the load, the movements within it, the strengthening of its various component parts is necessary and services other than medical (transport, communications, etc.) are essential. The establishment of a multihospital system for disaster situations for a whole region is suggested. This would integrate all medical facilities and services of the region, as well as promoting additional services, first horizontally integrated and later vertically, and would have a central governing body with full authority to prepare the system for the calamity and to execute the implementation of the plan when disaster occurs. This body may find it useful to base some of its decision in the planning as well as the implementing stage, on an assumed population of casualties that is characteristic for the region and on implications that may be drawn from the population.     

Health care system hazard vulnerability analysis: an assessment of all public hospitals in Abu Dhabi

Hazard vulnerability analysis (HVA) is used to risk‐stratify potential threats, measure the probability of those threats, and guide disaster preparedness. The primary objective of this project was to analyse the level of disaster preparedness in public hospitals in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, utilising the HVA tool in collaboration with the Disaster Medicine Section at Harvard Medical School. The secondary objective was to review each facility's disaster plan and make recommendations based on the HVA findings. Based on the review, this article makes eight observations, including on the need for more accurate data; better hazard assessment capabilities; enhanced decontamination capacities; and the development of hospital‐specific emergency management programmes, a hospital incident command system, and a centralised, dedicated regional disaster coordination centre. With this project, HVAs were conducted successfully for the first time in health care facilities in Abu Dhabi. This study thus serves as another successful example of multidisciplinary emergency preparedness processes.     

Mass casualty incident after the Taba terrorist attack: an organisational and medical challenge

Two suicide bombings in and around Taba, Egypt, on 7 October 2004 created a complex medical and organisational situation. Since most victims were Israeli tourists, the National Emergency and Disaster Management Division handled their evacuation and treatment. This paper describes the event chronologically, as well as the organisational and management challenges confronted and applied solutions. Forty-nine emergency personnel and physicians were flown early to the disaster area to reinforce scarce local medical resources. Two hundred casualties were recorded: 32 dead and 168 injured. Eilat hospital was transformed into a triage facility. Thirty-two seriously injured patients were flown to two remote trauma centres in central Israel. Management of mass casualty incidents is difficult when local resources are inadequate. An effective response should include: rapid transportation of experienced trauma teams to the disaster zone; conversion of local medical amenities into a triage centre; and rapid evacuation of the seriously injured to higher level medical facilities.     

三峡库区武隆县地质灾害研究

武隆县是三峡库区地质灾害较为严重的城镇之一,滑坡、危岩、崩塌、泥石流等地质灾害分布广,危害程度大,严重地制约着地方经济和社会的可持续发展。在大量野外调查的基础上,分析了该地区地质灾害的主要类型及其分布特征,从地形地貌、岩土体性质、地下水、降雨、人类工程活动等方面总结了地质灾害成灾机理。在此基础上,进一步提出了该地区地质灾害的防治对策和措施,力求有效地预防和减少地质灾害的发生。     

四川九寨沟县关庙沟泥石流及其防治对策

关庙沟为嘉陵江上游支流白水江右岸的一条支沟,位于四川九寨沟县城区,曾多次发生过严重的泥石流灾害,直接威胁县城和九寨沟旅游环线公路的安全。该沟泥石流具有容重大(2.20t/m~3)、搬运固体物质粒径粗、固体物质以沟岸滑坡和沟床堆积物补给为主等特征。本文分析了该沟泥石流的形成、流体性质、类型等基本特征,预测灾害的发展趋势,提出泥石流减灾防灾对策。     

云南相似大震人员伤亡差异因素分析

1976年云南龙陵、1988年云南澜沧-耿马地震发震时间、地点、震级相近,地震类型相近(双主震),极震区烈度相同,灾区社会经济状况基本相似,但人员伤亡相差10倍。通过对比分析找出云南两次相似大震人员伤亡的主要差异因素:预警型前震(或临震预报发布)是减少地震人员伤亡的最重要因素;高烈度区(Ⅸ)面积大小是影响人员伤亡的最重要因素。特定环境条件下次生灾害(震后火灾)对死亡人数有影响;集体行为的偶然因素对死亡人数也有影响。     

The application of seismic risk-benefit analysis to land use planning in Taipei City

In the developing countries of Asia local authorities rarely use risk analysis instruments as a decision-making support mechanism during planning and development procedures. The main purpose of this paper is to provide a methodology to enable planners to undertake such analyses. We illustrate a case study of seismic risk-benefit analysis for the city of Taipei, Taiwan, using available land use maps and surveys as well as a new tool developed by the National Science Council in Taiwan--the HAZ-Taiwan earthquake loss estimation system. We use three hypothetical earthquakes to estimate casualties and total and annualised direct economic losses, and to show their spatial distribution. We also characterise the distribution of vulnerability over the study area using cluster analysis. A risk-benefit ratio is calculated to express the levels of seismic risk attached to alternative land use plans. This paper suggests ways to perform earthquake risk evaluations and the authors intend to assist city planners to evaluate the appropriateness of their planning decisions.     

The effect of local calamities on educational achievement

This study investigates the impact of two local calamities-an explosion at a firework factory in the city of Enschede on 13 May and a fire at a discotheque on 1 January 2001 during a New Years Eve party in the town of Volendam-on the educational achievement of children at the end of their primary education. Based on a quasi-experimental design with both control groups and pre-tests, we found that in the three years following the two tragedies, the test scores of girls in those areas closest to the events were on average 0.2 standard deviations lower. This corresponds to a downward shift in the distribution of girls' test scores. Boys' test scores, meanwhile, were not significantly affected by the disasters, and nor were the scores of pupils from nearby areas. In the three years following the calamities, girls' test scores in one of the areas (Volendam) have slowly recovered, although they remain well below their pre-event level.     

"深圳-巴彦浩特"地理样带土地利用与水旱灾害研究

在建立1990-2000年“深圳-巴彦浩特“地理样带水旱灾害数据库的基础上,结合样带1995、2000年两期的土地利用数据,分析了样带水旱灾害的区域差异,及其与样带土地利用时空格局的关系.结果表明,样带水旱灾害呈现较强的南北差异,北方以旱灾为主,南方以水灾为主;土地利用结构对样带水旱灾害有较强的影响,土地利用类型复杂的县市有较高的水旱灾害发生率,而土地利用类型单一的县市则受水旱灾害影响较小.水灾主要出现在样带南部多种土地利用类型混杂的县市,特别是城镇建设用地比例较高的地区,水灾相对更为频繁;旱灾在缺乏灌溉水源且以耕地和草地为主要土地利用类型的区域发生频率较高.     

灾害现场救援大批伤员分类的方法

为及时准确地处理灾害现场的大批伤员,首先需要迅速实施伤员分类,因而各级参加灾害医学救援的救治机构,都应成立由受过分类训练的有经验的医疗技术人员和医疗管理人员组成的伤员分类组织,并配备必要的分类、急救器材。灾害医学救援应有统一的分类标准、规范的分类方法、统一的分类标志,才能使伤员分类工作进行得既快速又准确,使多数伤员能得到及时、合理的救治。