A frequente ocorrência de desastres naturais gera impactos sociais e econômicos cada vez maiores, impondo a necessidade de elaborar estratégias de prevenção e redução de riscos. No cenário nacional, os desastres causados por eventos hidrológicos representam a maior parte das ocorrências. Acidentes de maior exposição e maiores consequências são os ocasionados por movimentos gravitacionais de massa. Assim, as iniciativas de prevenção de desastres necessariamente passam pelo detalhamento do conhecimento do problema, o que deve orientar o estabelecimento de metas de ações de redução de risco, instrumentos de gestão e resposta, e ainda para sistemas de monitoramento e alerta. Estes sistemas necessariamente devem contar com mapeamentos dos locais de risco, rede de coleta de dados meteorológicos que subsidiem previsões de eventos hidrológicos, e o estabelecimento dos limiares críticos de chuva deflagradores de escorregamentos. Com tais objetivos, órgãos governamentais promoveram esforços no mapeamento dos riscos, em escalas adequadas, e o investimento na estruturação de redes de monitoramento hidrometeorológico, sendo necessárias iniciativas de elaboração de limiares críticos regionalizados a serem amplamente desenvolvidas. Dentro do cenário da gestão de riscos descritos, este trabalho teve como principal objetivo a determinação de limiares críticos de chuva deflagradores de movimentos gravitacionais de massa no município de São Bernardo do Campo. Baseando-se na avaliação dos dados de série histórica de pluviometria, e de um banco de dados formado a partir das ocorrências de escorregamentos atendidas no município, compreendendo 415 escorregamentos ao longo de 24 anos (1993 a 2016). Os resultados da correlação dos dados do meio físico, da pluviometria e das ocorrências de escorregamentos, permitiram uma série de análises da distribuição das ocorrências. A distribuição foi feita ao longo do tempo, em função de acumulados de chuva e em função dos aspectos do meio físico. Foram feitas também correlações da intensidade das chuvas em função da espacialização e acumulados de chuva. As correlações espaciais dos dados permitiram o estabelecimento de uma ferramenta que relaciona as caracterizações do meio físico com as ocorrências de escorregamentos, que foi denominado como Coeficiente de Ocorrências por Área (COPA). Este coeficiente indicou os elementos do meio físico de maior influência na deflagração de movimentos de massa na área de estudo, em ordem de prioridade os destaques foram: 1) muito alta densidade de ocupação; 2) padrões e morfologias de relevo de morros altos e morros baixos; 3) alta densidade de ocupação; 4) unidade geológica do Micaxisto; e 5) terrenos com inclinação superior a 25°. Destaca-se que o trabalho contribuiu para o conhecimento da resposta dos elementos de frente a processos hidrometeorológicos e para a definição de limiares críticos de chuva deflagradora de escorregamentos, determinando uma equação numérica de previsão de ocorrências a partir dos dados pluviométricos e de previsões meteorológicas. Estes resultados também puderam contribuir no estabelecimento de parâmetros técnico-científicos para refinar a gestão do risco de movimentos de massa em São Bernardo do Campo-SP, e das relações desses eventos com o meio físico para estabelecimento de estudos em outras localidades. / The frequent occurrence of landslides in Brazil has been the cause of larger issues, economically and socially, which explains the necessity to elaborate preventing strategies in order to reduce such risks to the population. Looking at the Brazilian panorama, the disasters caused by hydrological events represent the greater part of these occurrences. Mass gravitational movements cause accidents of a bigger exposure and have greater consequences. Thus, the prevention strategies must go through a detailed study, in order to gather knowledge to better understand the problem as a whole; this information must orientate the establishment of targets for risk reduction actions, management and response instruments, as well as the monitoring and alert systems. These systems must have risk mapping and meteorological data collection networks, in order to predict hydrological events and establish critical limits to landslides caused by rainfall. With these bjectives, government agencies have promoted efforts to map these areas in adequate scales, as well as investing and structuring hydrometereological monitoring networks, requiring initiatives to elaborate regionalized critical groundsels to be extensively developed. Within the scenario of risk management described, this study has the objective to determine critical thresholds triggered by rainfall of mass gravitational movements at the municipality of Sao Bernardo do Campo. Based on the evaluation of the historical data of rainfall, and database gathered from the occurrences of landslides that took place in the same municipality as well as, comprising 415 landslides that have happened for over 24 years (from 1993 to 2016). The correlated results in the physical environment data on occurrences of landslides caused by rainfall, started a series of analyzes on the distribution of these occurrences. This distribution was made throughout the described timeline, due to accumulated rain damage and other environmental aspects. Correlations on the rainfall intensity were also made due to the spacing of the damaged land. This spacing correlated data allowed the establishment of a tool that relates the characterizations of the environment with the gathered data on landslides, which was named as the Coefficient of Occurrences per Area (COPA). This coefficient indicates the physical environment elements, and had the greatest influence on the deflagration of mass movements at the studied area. In priority order, the emphasized topics were: 1) very high density of land occupation; 2) landforms high hills and low hills; 3) high density of land occupation; 4) geological unity of Mica Schist; and 5) terrains with an inclination higher than 25°. This study contributes to the knowledge on how the physical environment elements reacts ahead of hydrometeorological processes and to the definition of critical limits of rainfall that triggers landslides. Also, it has determined a numerical equation to landslides prediction from rainfall data and meteorological forecast. All these results could also contribute to the establishment of technical-scientific parameters, refining mass movement risk management at the city of São Bernardo do Campo, São Paulo State, and the relationship between these events to the physical environment for the establishment of future studies in other cities.

The number of people around the world who are affected by humanitarian crises has almost doubled in the past decade. For instance, in 2016, Southern Africa experienced the worst drought in 35 years, due to the weather phenomenon El Niño, and all aspects of society were affected. The aim of this thesis is to identify and analyse different types of challenges humanitarian relief programmes face in their disaster management in two different contexts: a conflict and a non-conflict context. The thesis combines both disaster management and peace and conflict studies. Interviews have been conducted in Zimbabwe (non-conflict) and Mozambique (conflict) with INGOs, UN organisations and donors that were involved in the humanitarian relief programmes in the countries during the El Niño induced drought in 2016. The programmes experienced various challenges, and additional challenges have been found in the humanitarian relief programmes in Mozambique due to the conflict. This thesis contributes to the existing theory with one piece of the puzzle: combining the theories on disaster management and peace and conflict studies and showing that neighbouring countries to those in conflict are likely to get spillover challenges from the country in conflict, primarily due to issues with refugees.

Cultural competence is critical to public service, yet it is often ignored and underutilized, especially in post-disaster response and recovery. The current literature on cultural competence and frameworks developed by the private sector do not fully consider the complexities of a post-disaster public service context. This project explores the importance of cultural competence in post-disaster response and recovery, identifies effective training methods and organizational policies which may present barriers to competence acquisition, and proposes a new theoretical framework by which to assess cultural competence in international response and recovery work. This study used focus groups with Haitian beneficiaries (n=7), in-depth interviews with response and recovery workers (n=50), close ended surveys with both groups (n=226), observation, and a review of secondary sources (e.g. job announcements, training manuals) to explore cultural competence from the perspectives of international response and recovery workers, their agencies, and Haitian beneficiaries after the January 2010 Haitian earthquake. The analysis revealed that although 88% of participating aid workers identified cultural competence (CC) as critical to program effectiveness, 42% had no training before or during deployment. An analysis of the job announcements revealed that only 37% of agencies required cultural competencies. While aid workers and beneficiaries identified experiential strategies (e.g. immersion, mentoring) as critical to cultural competence acquisition, organizational policies (e.g. curfews, restrictions on travel) were often found to be at odds with these methods and more than 1/3 of participating aid workers felt that these policies were a barrier to cultural competency. Findings from this study may help aid workers better understand the importance of cultural competence and how it can improve the effectiveness of aid programs, and provide ways in which aid agencies can enhance cultural competence acquisition by their employees.

This master's thesis presents the development and evaluation of an application visualising the operators' current positions in disaster area operations. The application was developed to address limitations in their current working methods, which currently rely on verbal communication and manual position mapping. The requirements and needs of the end-users were identified at the beginning of the study. Then, the application was developed over three iterations and improved iteratively based on the requirements and results of the evaluations. The proposed solution visualises the operators' positions on a map that can be supported in an off-the-grid environment. End-users evaluated the application to measure the level of usability and the impact the new system would have. The findings indicated that an application can impact today's operations by providing operators with better situational awareness. Further, the application could lead to more safe and efficient operations. Overall, this master's thesis adds to the continuous improvement of operational capabilities in disaster areas using technology.

This dissertation studies two important problems in the field of biomass supply chain network. In the first part of the dissertation, we study the pre-disaster planning problem that seeks to strengthen the links between the multi-modal facilities of a biomass supply chain network. A mixed-integer nonlinear programming model is developed to determine the optimal locations for multi-modal facilities and bio-refineries, offer suggestions on reliability improvement at vulnerable links, production at bio-refineries, and make transportation decision under both normal and disrupted scenarios. The aim is to assist investors in determining which links’ reliability can be improved under specific budget limitations so that the biouel supply chain network can prevent possible losses when transportation links are disrupted because of natural disasters. We used states Mississippi and Alabama as a testing ground for our model. As part of numerical experimentation, some realistic hurricane scenarios are presented to determine the potential impact that pre-investing may have on improving the bio-mass supply chain network’s reliability on vulnerable transportation links considering limited budget availability. In the second part of the dissertation, we study the impact of feedstock supply uncertainty on the design and management of an inbound biomass coiring supply chain network. A two-stage stochastic mixed integer linear programming model is developed to determine the optimal use of multi-modal facilities, biomass storage and processing plants, and shipment routes for delivering biomass to coal plants under feedstock supply uncertainty while considering congestion into account. To represent a more realistic case, we generated a scenario tree based on the prediction errors obtained from historical and forecasted feedstock supply availability. We linearized the nonlinear problem and solved with high quality and in a time efficient manner by using a hybrid decomposition algorithm that connects a Constraint generation algorithm with Sample average approximation algorithm and enhanced Progressive hedging algorithm. We used states Mississippi and Alabama as a testing ground for our study and conducted thorough computational experiments to test our model and to draw managerial insights.

Scholars from various disciplines have long attempted to identify the variables most closely associated with individual preparedness. Therefore, we now have much more knowledge regarding these factors and their association with individual preparedness behaviors. However, it has not been sufficiently discussed how decisive many of these factors are in encouraging preparedness. In this article, we seek to examine what factors, among the many examined in previous studies, are most central to engendering emergency preparedness in individuals particularly for tornadoes by utilizing a relatively uncommon machine learning technique in disaster management literature. Using unique survey data, we find that in the case of tornado preparedness the most decisive variables are related to personal experiences and economic circumstances rather than basic demographics. Our findings contribute to scholarly endeavors to understand and promote individual tornado preparedness behaviors by highlighting the variables most likely to shape tornado preparedness at an individual level.

[pt] Nas últimas décadas, situações de desastres têm se tornado cada vez mais comuns. Resultantes de processos estruturais profundamente desiguais, os desastres vêm sendo tratados, hegemonicamente, como eventos isolados, sem relação com o sistema social no qual se inserem. Esta tese de doutorado teve como principal objetivo conhecer o lugar ocupado por assistentes sociais na gestão de desastres no Brasil. O estudo partiu de uma revisão bibliográfica da teoria crítica, especialmente em relação às categorias desastres e riscos, consideradas fundamentais para a compreensão da temática, e contou com a realização de uma pesquisa baseada na triangulação de método, a partir da qual as abordagens quantitativa e qualitativa são compreendidas como complementares. A etapa quantitativa da pesquisa envolveu 142 órgãos municipais de proteção e defesa civil de todo o país, enquanto a segunda etapa, de caráter qualitativo, foi composta de um estudo de caso com base em entrevistas realizadas em cinco municípios afetados pelo impacto de 2011, no interior do estado do Rio de Janeiro. Os resultados da pesquisa demonstraram uma significativa ausência de assistentes sociais nos órgãos municipais de proteção e defesa civil, assim como o predomínio de uma intervenção voltada para a execução de ações pontuais e fragmentadas, geralmente desenvolvidas a partir da convocação de profissionais lotadas nos órgãos responsáveis pela política de assistência social nos municípios. Entende-se que tanto a ausência de assistentes sociais quanto o tipo de trabalho realizado não se encontram descolados da lógica predominante na gestão de desastres atualmente, na qual o foco nas ações desenvolvidas após a ocorrência dos impactos prevalece reforçando o caráter subalternizado do Serviço Social junto às equipes multiprofissionais, ainda que sejam ensejados esforços no sentido contrário. A partir destas conclusões, o estudo em questão volta-se para a defesa de uma maior participação de assistentes sociais nas estruturas de proteção e defesa civil, a necessidade de investimento em estudos sobre o campo dos desastres, assim como aponta para iniciativas que busquem um maior alinhamento entre as ações desenvolvidas por assistentes sociais na gestão de desastres e o projeto ético-político que vem sendo construído por segmentos da categoria desde as duas últimas décadas do século XX. / [en] In recent decades, disasters have become increasingly common. Resulting from profoundly unequal structural processes, disasters have been treated, hegemonically, as isolated events, unrelated to the social system in which they are inserted. This doctoral thesis had as main objective to know the place occupied by social assistants in the management of disasters in Brazil. The study was based on a bibliographical review of critical theory, especially in relation to the categories of disasters and risks, considered fundamental for the understanding of the thematic, and was based on the research based on the triangulation of method, from which the quantitative and Are understood as complementary. The quantitative phase of the survey involved 142 municipal protection and civil defense agencies throughout the country, while the second qualitative phase was composed of a case study based on interviews conducted in five municipalities affected by the impact of 2011 on Interior of the state of Rio de Janeiro. The results of the research demonstrated a significant absence of social workers in the municipal protection and civil defense agencies, as well as the predominance of an action directed to the implementation of punctual and fragmented actions, usually developed after the call of crowded professionals in the organs responsible for Social assistance policy in municipalities. It is understood that both the absence of social workers and the type of action performed are not detached from the prevailing logic in disaster management, in which the focus on the actions developed after the impacts occur prevails, reinforcing the Subalternized character of the Social Service with the multiprofessional teams, although efforts are made in the opposite direction. Based on these conclusions, the study in question turns to the defense of a greater participation of social workers in civil protection and defense structures, the need to invest in studies on the field of disasters, and points to initiatives that seek Greater alignment between actions developed by social workers in disaster management and the ethical-political project that has been built by segments of the category since the last two decades of the twentieth century.

This study was concerned with the following problem: What plan or procedures should the Lodi Elementary and Lodi Union High School Districts develop for civil defense and disaster preparedness in coordination with city, county, and state agencies? The specific purposes of this study were as follows: (1) To determine the need for a civil defense plan for the Lodi school districts.; (2) To determine the scope of civil defense plans for the Lodi school districts.; (3) To analyze various civil defense and disaster plans of other school districts.; (4) To investigate what civil defense and disaster plans have been formulated as the national and state levels.; (5) To develop a proposed plan for Lodi schools which will be in harmony with all other civil defense and disaster agencies, especially those within San Joaquin County.; and (6) To formulate a long range civil defense and disaster plan which can be adopted by the Lodi school districts.

Natural disasters such as hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, tsunamis, and earthquakes frequently happen across the world. Many of these natural disasters bring destruction to homes, loss of loved ones, and emotional or physical trauma. For children who are still developing coping skills, these natural disasters can bring them emotional distress because they are unable to processes their experiences in a healthy way. In a review of literature on the topic of bibliotherapy and reflective writing to help children learn coping skills, I discovered a need for these processes to be introduced in normal settings, such as school and home, to help children who have experienced natural disasters develop coping skills. My goal in conducting this research was to create a resource that includes a variety of children's literature on the topic of a natural disaster and that demonstrates a coping skill for that trauma. Guiding questions and reflective writing prompts were also added to this resource for the users to guide children in identifying and learning the demonstrated, healthy coping skills. I selected twenty-one quality and award-winning books that address natural disaster for review. Nineteen of them demonstrated a healthy coping skill within the book. Using the information from the book, I created guiding questions and reflective writing prompts to help guide the children in connecting with and learning how to use the coping skill demonstrated. Future developments from my research may include a website with the resource information or a hard copy that can be sent to areas of high-need or high-risk for natural disaster. My goal is that my resource will foster healthy coping skills for children in the school setting, home, or alongside professional help.

Research on risk perception, disaster preparedness, and hurricane risk communication among Hispanic/Latino individuals with disabilities is growing. However, there is limited understanding of how cultural factors influence risk perceptions, hurricane preparedness, and how emergency managers communicate hurricane risks to Hispanic/Latino individuals with developmental disabilities in Central Florida. This qualitative case study aims to fill this gap by exploring the cultural influence on risk perception and hurricane preparedness, as well as how local emergency managers communicate risks associated with hurricanes to Hispanic/Latino individuals with developmental disabilities. The study seeks to understand how culture can shape this population's risk perception and natural disaster preparedness for disasters like hurricanes. The researcher uses an integrative theoretical framework that combines the Cultural Theory of Risk, Protective Motivation Theory, and Familism to guide the study. In-depth individual and group interviews were conducted with a diverse sample of Hispanic/Latino families living with individuals with developmental disabilities. Interviewees were selected based on location, age, and cultural background. Additionally, the researcher conducted a desk review of hurricane communication from each Central Florida county, followed by individual interviews with the emergency managers from Central Florida counties. Data from Hispanic/Latino families living with individuals with developmental disabilities were analyzed using inductive and deductive methods to identify themes related to the effect of culture on risk perception and natural disaster preparedness, specifically for hurricanes. The study revealed that culture can influence risk perception and natural disaster preparedness among Hispanic/Latino individuals living with developmental disabilities in many ways. Moreover, data from the desk review and interviews with emergency managers indicated a preference for relying heavily on the social networks of Hispanic/Latino individuals with developmental disabilities to communicate hurricane risks. Keywords: Risk perception, cultural influence, developmental disabilities, hurricane preparedness, Hispanic/Latino, risk communication.