Resilience is the planning, strategy, and process of bringing the functions of a community community back to “normal” – i.e. the way it was before. Resilience does not necessarily mean recreating a facsimile of the system post-event. At any given moment in today’s world, one can witness, a community in the varying states related to resilience.
The intent of this section is to provide a very basic intro to the idea of resilience to both public and professionals not actively working in the field. While the focus of these writings are focused on North America many of the concepts and strategies are universally applicable across the globe.
Hazards & Risks
Hazards have the potential to harm or subject systems to adverse effects. A simple example of a hazard is a wet floor; wet floors provide less traction and are slick. These conditions create the potential for you to slip, trip, fall, and become injured. Whereas, risks are the mathematical chance of experiencing injury or adverse effects from the hazards. For example, the US Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) has calculated the risk of an accidental death in the workplace from slips, trips, and falls as 15%. Thus, the hazardous conditions associated with the wet floor present a 15% risk of you suffering a fatality resulting from a slip, trip, or fall.
Every community faces many unique hazards with varying degrees of risk.
Hazards and risks can vary based on natural, built, and social environmental factors. Natural factors are events that are difficult to predict and control, such as seasonal weather patterns, water behavior, regional climate variations, and geological features. Built factors are things that can be controlled and predicted fairly well, such as building design, site location, and infrastructure. Social environmental factors are tied to our beliefs, actions, and policies, including demographics, socio-economic conditions, and interactions between communities and systems.
Understanding the hazards present in a geographic region is crucial to building a community’s resilience. Each region will have its own unique set of hazards based on factors such as climate, geomorphology, and land use. This guide will examine hazards based on their location and origin, allowing for a better understanding of associated risks.
Hazards Simplified
Local Hazards refer to events that occur in the vicinity of where you live, work, or spend your leisure time. These events are generally limited in scope and affect only a small area. For instance, a sudden and intense thunderstorm during summers that affects only a few streets or blocks.
Local Hazards refer to events that occur in the vicinity of where you live, work, or spend your leisure time. These events are generally limited in scope and affect only a small area. For instance, a sudden and intense thunderstorm during summers that affects only a few streets or blocks.
Regional Hazards, on the other hand, are larger in scale and impact a wider geographical area. These hazards may affect multiple counties, states, or even countries. For instance, earthquakes are more frequent on the west coast of the United States and Mexico compared to the eastern regions.
Natural Hazards are incidents caused by natural phenomena, and humans have little or no control over them. Earthquakes are a classic example of natural hazards, which can have significant and devastating impacts on human lives.
Human Influenced Hazards are those hazards that arise due to human activities or decisions, which we can mitigate or prevent through proper planning and action. While earthquakes themselves are natural hazards, the lack of proper planning or constructing buildings that can withstand them is a human-influenced hazard.
Risks
Risks refer to the possibility of harm, damage, loss, or other adverse consequences resulting from an event. Risks can stem from a range of factors, including natural phenomena, technological hazards, human error, financial uncertainty, and more. To build resilience, it is crucial to mitigate risks by identifying potential hazards and deploying measures to reduce their impact. When communities work collaboratively to identify the risks associated with natural, built, and social environmental factors, they can prioritize the hazards they are most likely to face. It is important to note that community members often possess valuable knowledge about hazards and risks that may complement or enhance data analysis. This information can be used to develop risk mitigation strategies that address specific vulnerabilities and enable communities and supporting agencies to respond effectively in the event of a hazard.