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Humanity is deeply committed to living along the world’s shores, but a catastrophic storm like Sandy—which took hundreds of lives and caused many billions of dollars in damages—shines a bright light at how costly and vulnerable life on a shoreline can be. Taking Chances offers a wide-ranging exploration of the diverse challenges of Sandy and asks if this massive event will really change how coastal living and development is managed. Bringing together leading researchers—including biologists, urban planners, utilities experts, and climatologists, among others—Taking Chances illuminates reactions to the dangers revealed by Sandy. Focusing on New Jersey, New York, and other hard-hit areas, the contributors explore whether Hurricane Sandy has indeed transformed our perceptions of coastal hazards, if we have made radically new plans in response to Sandy, and what we think should be done over the long run to improve coastal resilience. Surprisingly, one essay notes that while a large majority of New Jerseyans identified Sandy with climate change and favored carefully assessing the likelihood of damage from future storms before rebuilding the Shore, their political leaders quickly poured millions into reconstruction. Indeed, much here is disquieting. One contributor points out that investors scared off from further investments on the shore are quickly replaced by new investors, sustaining or increasing the overall human exposure to risk. Likewise, a study of the Gowanus Canal area of Brooklyn shows that, even after Sandy swamped the area with toxic flood waters, plans to convert abandoned industrial lots around the canal into high-density condominiums went on undeterred. By contrast, utilities, emergency officials, and others who routinely make long-term plans have changed operations in response to the storm, and provide examples of adaptation in the face of climate change. Will Sandy be a tipping point in coastal policy debates—or simply dismissed as a once-in-a-century anomaly? This thought-provoking collection of essays in Taking Chances makes an important contribution to this debate.
It was almost November 2012 when Hurricane Sandy, a late arrival in an otherwise quiet tropical season, slammed into the Mid-Atlantic US coastline. Millions of residents were plunged into darkness and billions of dollars in property and infrastructure were flooded or washed away in surging waters. Blizzard conditions struck the Appalachians as the hybrid Halloween monster moved inland. Savage Sand and Surf: The Hurricane Sandy Disaster is multi-faceted examination into one of the most recent natural disasters in the United States. Scholars from multiple disciplines address a wide range of important aspects of this event, including unique meteorological and social impacts of Sandy, Sandy’s intersection with vulnerable social groups in society, and social institutions’ adaptations to the disaster. Also, different theoretical models of disasters are explored and applied to better understand and prepare for similar events in the future.
The Mid-Atlantic region of the United States is susceptible to many tropical cyclone hazards such as storm surge, damaging winds, and flooding from heavy rainfall. Within the past fifteen years this region has experienced hurricanes Isabel in 2003 and Irene in 2011, as well as several tropical storms. This region was also influenced by post-tropical Sandy in 2012. The perception of hurricane hazards among residents of the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States is currently unknown as there is a lack of research on the comprehension of information from warning graphics. This research uses a total of 8 hypothetical scenarios (4 pairs) that vary each hurricane's track and size to assess hurricane hazard risk perception. Each scenario is represented using a four-paneled graphic featuring the National Hurricane Center's Cone of Uncertainty, a new storm surge map, and a new damaging wind map created by the authors. A Qualtrics survey created and administered via email, asked Mid-Atlantic residents key questions about their concern for personal harm and evacuation plans. Participants of this survey perceive potential for damaging winds, falling trees, and the size of the storm to be the greatest threats. Both scenarios with track lines that moved inland were also seen as most concerning. Evacuation rates were greatest for each large storm and for both scenarios where the track line moved inland.
When Hurricane Sandy made landfall on October 29, 2012, it brought much of the New York-New Jersey-Connecticut metropolitan area to a standstill. It flooded key arteries in and out of New York City, including the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel and Amtrak's Hudson River Transit Tunnel. It disabled power plants and transmission lines, leaving 8.5 million customers in three states without electricity, some for weeks. The storm surge easily overtopped protective dunes and floodwalls from Atlantic City to New London, damaging more than 600,000 homes and killing 60 people. In the months following the disaster, the federal government marshaled significant financial and technical resources to help communities recover and rebuild. With preliminary damage estimates in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut topping $50 billion, the scope of the devastation inspired new ideas about how to adapt to changing conditions. Hurricane Sandy was a wakeup call that elevated the discussion about disasters and climate change at all levels of government. Public officials realized that the regional reach of the storm demanded a new approach to disaster relief and recovery. Current strategies for disaster recovery, urban planning, and coastal management were no longer viable; in the face of rising sea levels, these outdated approaches undermined riverine and coastal ecosystems, endangering people, property, and the economy. The response to Hurricane Sandy offers a number of important lessons for building climate-resilient coastal regions. This report defines resilience as the capacity to recover quickly from shocks and stressors while at the same time reducing future risk. By strengthening and integrating this connection between disaster recovery and rebuilding--between short-term and long-range actions following a disaster--we gain further critical opportunities to build even greater resilience. This report, copublished with Regional Plan Association, identifies a set of policies, regulations, and administrative practices that federal agencies can adopt to help coastal metropolitan areas become more resilient. In addition, this research documents how state and local governments recovering from Hurricane Sandy sought to use federal aid to create a more resilient region, and it describes the obstacles they encountered. The report concludes with specific policy recommendations to position federal agencies to help coastal regions adapt to a changing climate. These recommendations can help advance a national strategy for disaster recovery that helps coastal regions adapt to future conditions by integrating hazard mitigation and risk management approaches into federal policies. They include the following measures: - Anticipate future climate impacts during the disaster recovery and rebuilding processes. - Align federal policies and programs to reduce risk and restore the health and productivity of coastal resources over the long term. - Enable effective urban infrastructure and development patterns. - Develop and share data, guidance materials, and decision-support tools to help governments and property owners make forward-thinking decisions.
Vulnerability of older adults in all stages of a disaster is well recognized by both scholars and practitioners. However, most relevant empirical research to date has focused on disaster recovery and reconstruction, leaving unanswered the "how" and "why" questions surrounding disaster preparedness and response among older people. The older people?s perceptions of natural hazard risks have been even less explored. To address these research gaps, this study uses a case study of older residents of Sarasota County, Florida and applies a qualitative method to understand the perception, preparedness, and evacuation intention of older people at risk from hurricane hazards. The individual in-depth interviews generate several findings. First, while older residents? knowledge of hurricane threats varied from simple to sophisticated, their perceptions of hurricane risks were predominantly low due to a local myth and hurricane quiescence in recent memory. Second, most older residents took generic actions by preparing extra water, food, and medications, but lacked efforts in more hurricane-specific preparedness due to complacency and lack of awareness, financial capital, and social capital. Third, although a minority of older residents would definitely either shelter in place or evacuate, most demonstrated flexibility with hurricane evacuation and would make spontaneous and situational choices for staying versus leaving in the event of a hurricane. In sum, this dissertation utilizes a qualitative inquiry to weave richer personal and contextual details that are less visible through a quantitative lens to make sense of a population-specific and site-specific vulnerability to hurricane hazards. As the older populations continue to grow in size and diversify in characteristics, my research aims to advance understanding of the internal commonality and variability among older adults and help inform need-based rather than strictly age-contingent policies for hazard vulnerability reduction and resilience building.
Sandy, the second-largest Atlantic storm on record, affected the East Coast from Florida to Maine, as well as states as far inland as West Virginia, Ohio, and Indiana. The storm made landfall in southern New Jersey on October 29, 2012, battering the densely populated New York and New Jersey region with heavy rains, strong winds, and record storm surges. The storm's effects were extensive, leaving more than 8.5 million customers without power, causing widespread flooding throughout the region, and contributing to acute fuel shortages in parts of New York and New Jersey. The storm damaged or destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes, caused tens of billions of dollars in damages, and killed at least 162 people in the United States. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) coordinated a large-scale Federal response that contributed to the integrated, national effort to support affected states and communities. In the days before Sandy's landfall, FEMA worked closely with Whole Community partners— including all levels of government, private and nonprofit sectors, faith-based organizations, communities, and individuals—to prepare for the storm and anticipate survivor needs. The Agency pre-positioned commodities and assets, activated response centers, and deployed over 900 personnel ahead of Sandy's landfall. In the initial response to the storm, the Agency coordinated with its partners to provide Federal resources and to develop innovative solutions to address power restoration, transportation, fuel distribution, and housing needs. As recovery efforts began, FEMA continued to work with its partners to assist survivors and their communities. The Agency executed one of the largest deployments of personnel in its history, delivered over $1.2 billion in housing assistance to more than 174,000 survivors, and obligated over $800 million for debris removal and infrastructure restoration. Despite these successes, the response to Sandy also revealed notable challenges in how FEMA coordinates with its Federal partners, supports state and local officials and disaster survivors, integrates with the Whole Community, and prepares and deploys its workforce. Difficulties with issuing timely mission assignments, the implementation of incident management structures, and meeting survivor needs early in the response phase are examples of challenges that emerged during Sandy. Addressing these and other issues is a near-term priority for FEMA and its partners in order to improve response and recovery operations in future disasters. Ultimately, the Sandy experience demonstrated significant progress achieved in recent years, but also confirmed that larger-scale incidents will stress the Agency's capacity for effective response and recovery. This report was written following response and initial recovery efforts to Hurricane Sandy. Any recommendations or findings that result from other interagency Sandy-related efforts will continue to be reviewed. At the direction of FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate, the Agency established the Sandy Analysis Team to review all aspects of the Agency's preparations for, immediate response to, and initial recovery from the storm. This report contains the findings of that review. While FEMA coordinates disaster response and recovery efforts across the Federal Government and works closely with non-Federal Whole Community partners, this report focuses on identified strengths and areas for improvement within FEMA. The analyses detailed in the report concentrate on FEMA activities in New York and New Jersey, where the scale and severity of Sandy's impacts most stressed the Agency's capabilities. By examining the events in these states, the Agency can identify where and how it must improve.
The perception of risk to natural hazards is a very complex topic and there are multiple factors that influence it. However, two factors have generally been overlooked. Through the use of mail-out surveys of residents in Beaufort County and Dare County, North Carolina, this research explores how risk perception varies with location and addresses how changes in the characteristics of a hurricane influence the perception of their risk to hurricanes. Location is addressed using two definitions. The first definition used the physical location of the resident (either Inner Banks or Outer Banks), while the second definition used the anticipated impacts from the hurricane (flooding, storm surge, wind damage). This created three locational factors that were tested for their association with risk perception. Hurricane Irene provides an interesting case study because of the change in track and intensity prior to landfall. Using the Chi Square Test for Association, the results show a significant difference in risk perception with location. Based on location on either the Inner Banks or Outer Banks, risk perception varies with respect to the issued advisories. Based on residing in one of the damage areas, risk perception varies with hazards associated with hurricanes. Results also show that track change and intensity change influence the perception of risk. Based on track change, Inner Banks residents believed they were at greater risk and had increases in their perceptions of personal risk. However, based on intensity change, Outer Banks residents perceived themselves to be at more risk than did Inner Banks residents. Overall, a majority of respondents believed that the track change increased the hazards associated with hurricanes, while the intensity reduction decreased them. While both location and damage area show their own associations with risk perception, combining location with damage area presents a broader picture of how risk perception varies with location.
Partial summary - his study focuses on levels of concern for hurricanes among individuals living along the Gulf Coast during the quiescent two-year period following the exceptionally destructive 2005 hurricane season. A small study of risk perception and optimistic bias was conducted immediately following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita... A significant and stronger potentially causal effect from risk perception to optimistic bias was found. Analysis of the experience and demographic variables’ effects on risk perception and optimistic bias, and their change, provided mixed results. The lessening of risk perception and increase in optimistic bias over the period of quiescence suggest that risk communicators and emergency managers should direct attention toward reversing these trends to increase disaster preparedness.