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Few subjects have caught the attention of the entire world as much as those dealing with natural hazards. The first decade of this new millennium provides a litany of tragic examples of various hazards that turned into disasters affecting millions of individuals around the globe. The human losses (some 225,000 people) associated with the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami, the economic costs (approximately 200 billion USD) of the 2011 Tohoku Japan earthquake, tsunami and reactor event, and the collective social impacts of human tragedies experienced during Hurricane Katrina in 2005 all provide repetitive reminders that we humans are temporary guests occupying a very active and angry planet. Any examples may have been cited here to stress the point that natural events on Earth may, and often do, lead to disasters and catastrophes when humans place themselves into situations of high risk.
Few subjects share the true interdisciplinary dependency that characterizes the field of natural hazards. From geology and geophysics to engineering and emergency response to social psychology and economics, the study of natural hazards draws input from an impressive suite of unique and previously independent specializations. Natural hazards provide a common platform to reduce disciplinary boundaries and facilitate a beneficial synergy in the provision of timely and useful information and action on this critical subject matter.
As social norms change regarding the concept of acceptable risk and human migration leads to an explosion in the number of megacities, coastal over-crowding and unmanaged habitation in precarious environments such as mountainous slopes, the vulnerability of people and their susceptibility to natural hazards increases dramatically. Coupled with the concerns of changing climates, escalating recovery costs, a growing divergence between more developed and less developed countries, the subject of natural hazards remains on the forefront of issues that affect all people, nations, and environments all the time.
This treatise provides a compendium of critical, timely and very detailed information and essential facts regarding the basic attributes of natural hazards and concomitant disasters. The Encyclopedia of Natural Hazards effectively captures and integrates contributions from an international portfolio of almost 300 specialists whose range of expertise addresses over 330 topics pertinent to the field of natural hazards. Disciplinary barriers are overcome in this comprehensive treatment of the subject matter. Clear illustrations and numerous color images enhance the primary aim to communicate and educate. The inclusion of a series of unique "classic case study" events interspersed throughout Encyclopedia of Natural Hazards provides tangible examples linking concepts, issues, outcomes and solutions. These case studies illustrate different but notable recent, historic and prehistoric events that have shaped the world as we now know it. They provide excellent focal points linking the remaining terms in Encyclopedia of Natural Hazards to the primary field of study. This Encyclopedia of Natural Hazards will remain a standard reference of choice for many years.
- A'lav
- Accelerometer
- 'Act of God'
- Aerial photography for hazard recognition
- Albedo
- Animals and hazards
- Antecedent conditions
- Anti-seismic design
- Ash
- Asteroids
- Automated Local Evaluation in Real Time (ALERT) system
- Avalanches
- Aviation, hazards to
- Avulsion
- Base surge
- Beach nourishment (replenishment)
- Beaufort scale of wind speeds
- Biblical events
- Body wave
- Breakwater
- Building codes
- Building failure
- Buildings, structures and public safety
- Calder
- Cartography of natural hazards
- Catastrophe and catastrophe theory
- Casualties in natural hazards
- Civil protection and civil contingencies management
- Classification of disasters
- Climate change
- Cloud seeding
- Coastal erosion
- Coastal zone, risk management
- Cognitive dissonance
- Cold spells and freezing weather hazards
- Collapsing soil hazards
- Comets
- Community management of hazards
- Convergence
- Cost-benefit analysis of natural hazard mitigation
- Costing and surveying damage
- Costs of natural hazards and disasters
- Creep
- Critical Incidence Stress Syndrome
- Cryological engineering
- Cyclone
- Damage and the built environment
- Debris avalanche (Sturzstrom)
- Debris flow
- Desertification
- Disaster
- Disaster relief
- Disease epidemics and pandemics
- Disease epidemiology of natural disasters
- Dispersive soil hazards
- Doppler radar and Nexrad
- Dose rate (of risk)
- Drought
- Dust Bowl, the
- Dust devil
- Dust storm
- Dvorak classification of hurricane seedlings
- Earthquake damage
- Earthquake prediction
- Earthquakes
- Economics of disasters
- Education and training for emergency preparedness
- Elastic rebound, theory of
- Electromagnetic radiation (EMR)
- El Nino Southern Oscillation, hazards associated with
- Emergency communication
- Emergency management
- Emergency mapping
- Emergency planning
- Emergency shelter
- Epicentre
- Erodibility
- Erosion
- Erosivity
- Evacuation
- Expansive soils and clays
- Expert systems for disaster management
- Exposure to natural hazards
- Extensometers and tiltmeters
- Failsafe design
- Famine
- Faults
- Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), USA
- Fetch
- Fire and firestorm
- Flash flood
- Flood deposits
- Flood hazards and disasters
- Floodplain
- Flood protection
- Flood stage
- Floodway
- Fluid withdrawal subsidence
- Fog hazards
- Fohn
- Forest and range fires (wildfire)
- Frequency and magnitude of events
- Frost hazards
- Fumarole
- Gap, seismic
- Gases
- Geographic information systems (GIS) and natural hazards
- Geological/geophysical disasters
- Glacier hazards
- Global change and its implications for natural disaster
- Global Positioning System (GPS) and natural hazards
- Global Telemetered Seismograph Network (GTSN)
- Groin
- Hadley cell
- Hail and hailstorms
- Harmonic tremor
- Hazard
- Hazardousness of place
- Heat waves
- High-rise buildings in natural disaster
- Historical events
- History of natural disasters
- Hospitals in disaster
- Human impact of hazards
- Human life, economic value of
- Humanity as an agent of geological disaster
- Hurricane (tropical cyclone, typhoon)
- Hydrocompaction subsidence
- Hydrograph, flood
- Hydrometeorological hazards
- Hypocentre
- Ice and icebergs
- Inclinometer
- Indian Ocean tsunami
- Induced seismicity
- Information and communications technology
- Insects
- Insurance
- Integrated emergency management system
- Intensity measures
- International strategies for disaster reduction: the IDNDR and ISDR
- Internet, World Wide Web and natural hazards
- Inversion layer
- Isoseismal
- Jet stream
- Jokulhlaup (debacle)
- Karst hazards
- Krakatoa (Krakatau)
- Lahar
- Landsat (satellite)
- Landslide (mass movement)
- Land degradation
- Land subsidence
- Land use, urbanization and natural hazards
- Lateral spreading
- Lava
- Levee
- Lightning
- Liquefaction
- Loading, consolidation and compaction subsidence
- Loess
- Macroseismic survey
- Magma
- Magnitude scales
- Mantled karst, dolines (sinkholes)
- Marginalization
- Marine hazards
- Mass media and natural disasters
- Mass movement
- Medical emergencies
- Megacities and natural hazards
- Mercalli, Giuseppe
- Meteorite
- Microzonation and macrozonation of natural hazards
- Misconceptions about natural disaster
- Mitigation
- Models of hazard and disaster
- Modified Mercalli (MM) scale
- Monitoring and prediction of natural hazards
- Monsoon
- Mortality and morbidity in natural disasters
- Mudflow
- Myths and misconceptions
- Natural disaster
- Natural disasters in developing countries
- Natural hazard
- Natural radioactivity
- Neotectonics
- Non-structural mitigation
- Nuee ardente (glowing avalanche)
- Overgrazing
- Ozone
- Pacific Tsunami Warning System (PTWS)
- Pahoehoe lava
- Paleoseismology
- Perception of natural hazards and disasters
- Permafrost
- Piezometer
- Piping hazards
- Planning measures and political aspects
- Plate tectonics
- Political economy of soil erosion disasters
- Pore-water pressure
- Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
- Potential evapotranspiration (PET)
- Prediction of hazards
- Probable maximum precipitation (PMP)
- Primary (P wave)
- Psychological impacts of natural disasters
- Public health and sanitation in natural disasters
- Pyroclastiflow
- Quick clays and quick sands
- Radon hazards
- Recovery and reconstruction after disaster
- Recurrence interval
- Red Cross, the
- Release rate
- Remote sensing of natural hazards and disasters
- Reservoir dams and natural hazards
- Resilience
- Richter, Charles F. Risk estimation, assessment, management and communication
- Rogue wave
- Rotational slide
- San Andreas fault, California
- Santorini, eruption of
- Sea level change
- Search and rescue
- Sea surge
- Secondary (S wave)
- Sedimentation of rivers and reservoirs
- Seiche
- Seismic acceleration and attenuation
- Seismograph/seismometer
- Seismology
- Shear
- Shield volcano
- Simulation of natural disaster
- Sinkhole
- Slope stability
- Slumps and slides
- Snowstorms and blizzards
- Social behaviour
- Sociology of disasters
- Solifluction
- Storms and storm surge
- Structural mitigation
- Subduction
- Subsidence: economic and legal aspects
- Subsidence induced by underground mining
- Sunspots
- Supernova
- SurgeSusceptibilityTangshan, China (1976 earthquake)
- Tectonic and tectono-seismic hazards
- Tephra
- Thunderstorms
- Tidal bore
- Time and space in disaster
- Tornadoes
- Triage
- Tsunamis
- United Nations Organisation and natural disasters
- Universal soil loss equation (USLE)
- Unreinforced masonry building
- Urban environments and natural hazards
- Vajont Dam, Italy
- Vesuvius
- Volcanoes/volcanic eruptions
- Vulnerability
- Warning systems
- Waterspouts
- World economy, impact of disasters on
- World-wide trends in natural disasters
Peter Bobrowsky has been practising various aspects of geology for some 30 years. Based in Canada, his research in natural hazards has included fieldwork in North America, South America, India and China on topics ranging from paleo-tsunamis to landslide studies. His passion for studying the earth has taken him to some 100 countries.
