Emergencies and Disaster; Disaster management to reduce risks;

 Emergency, Disaster, Risk, Crisis:

        Emergency: Any situation that requires an immediate response, Sometimes life or lives can be at risk due to the emergency situation i.e. Road traffic accident, Hard fall, or high impact injuries, drawing and domestic fire e.t.c

        Disaster: Disaster can be defined as events that cause serious disruption to the services that are essential for human life or the normal operation of society and frequently result in widespread human and environmental losses

        Risk: The ability to harm is called risk

        Crisis: A time of intense difficulty or Danger is called a crisis.

1. Emergency: 

In any situation that requires an immediate response, Sometimes life or lives can be at risk due to an emergency situation i.e. Road traffic accident, Hard fall, or high impact injuries, drawing and domestic fire e.t.c

2. Types of Emergencies:

2.1. Natural Emergencies
2.2. Manmade Emergencies

2.1 Natural Emergencies:

        A natural emergency is an adverse event resulting from a natural process, such as a Heart Attack, snake bite, Fog, lightning, or Hailstorm.

2.2. Manmade Emergencies:

        A manmade emergency is caused directly and principally by one or more identifiable negligent human actions, such as a Road traffic accident, Drowning, bomb blast, poisoning, or falling.

3. Disaster:

        Disaster can be defined as events that cause serious disruption to the services that are essential for human life or the normal operation of society and frequently result in widespread human and environmental losses.

4. Types of Disaster:

4.1. Natural Disaster:
4.2. Manmade Disaster:

4.1. Natural Disaster:

        A natural disaster is a major adverse event resulting from natural processes of the earth, such as Floods, Winter storms, Earthquakes, Landslides, Debris flows, Wildfires, Droughts, or Pandemics.

4.2. Manmade Disaster:

        A disaster event is caused directly and principally by one or more identifiable negligent human actions. Manmade disaster involves an element of human intent, negligence, or error, or involves a failure of a man-made system i.e. terrorism, nuclear incident, Wars, Hazardous materials incident, Building collapse, etc.

5. Disaster Management:

        Specifically, disaster management is about the organization and directing resources to cope with a disaster and coordinating roles and responsibilities of responders, private sector organizations, public sector organizations, non-profit and faith-based organizations, volunteers, donations, etc.

6. Phases of Disaster:

6.1. Pre-Disaster Phase:
6.2. Alert and Warning Phase
6.3. Emergency Phase:
6.4. Recovery / Rehabilitation Phase:

6.1. Pre-Disaster Phase:

• Preparedness 
• includes preparedness activities that take place before an emergency occurs.
• plans or preparation made to save lives and to help in response and rescue operations.
• Evacuation plans and stocking food and water are both examples of preparedness.
• Mitigation / minimizing the effects of the disaster i.e. building codes, and public awareness.
• Buying flood and fire insurance for your home is a mitigation activity.
• Preparedness/planning how to respond i.e. preparedness plans; Emergency exercises/training;

6.2. Alert and Warning Phase:

        The period from the issuing of an alert or public warning of an imminent disaster threat to its actual impact, or the passage of the threat and the lifting of the warning.

6.3. Emergency Phase:

• Response
• Efforts to minimize the hazards created by a disaster. 
• Operation; Includes action taken to save lives and prevent further property damage in an emergency situation. The response is putting your preparedness plan into action. 
• Search and rescue operations; emergency relief.

6.4. Recovery / Rehabilitation Phase

•         The period following the emergency phase, during which actions are to be taken to enable victims to resume normal lives or an even safer situation and means of livelihood, and to restore infrastructure, services, and the economy.
• Recovery includes getting financial assistance to help pay for the repairs. 
• Recovery activities continue until all systems return to normal or better. Recovery measures, both short and long-term, include returning vital life-support systems to minimum operating standards; temporary housing; public information; health and safety education; reconstruction; counseling programs; and economic impact studies. Information resources and services include data collection related to rebuilding and documentation of lessons learned.