The death of a child spectator at the implosion of the Royal Canberra Hospital on 13 July 1997 was an accident that had a profound impact on the local community, prompting a significant cursive response. Promoted as a public spectacle, the implosion was planned as an orchestrated collision between past and future that would enable an instantaneous obliteration of past in order to create a site of future opportunities. When it resulted instead in a failed demolition and the death of a child, the reversal of popular expectation precipitated not only shock, grief and guilt, but also a widespread state of ontological instability. If a certain fascination with death and disaster had contributed to the event’s popular appeal before the implosion, it was compounded by feelings of guilt and shame in the event’s tragic aftermath. Those feelings, shared by public and journalists alike, were given expression in the mediated discursive space of the Canberra Times and other media outlets, resulting in an extensive rhetorical performance of witness, therapy and argument. In this thesis, I use the diversity of voices that are held together in the discursive web that forms the textual fabric of this study’s empirical data, not to create a historical, single perspective narrative, but to go some way in re-creating the event, and the immediate response to it, by allowing that discourse to be re-voiced. As the product of extensive cultural labour on the parts of those who produced it, the implosion discourse, of which this thesis is now a part, stands as a significant corpus of commemorative work. This discourse is evidence of an engaged polity – one that transcended the passive role prescribed for it of an audience as consumers of entertainment to become, through its own labour, agents, creators and performers of meaning. My central thesis is that it is in this cultural performance that the true practice of ‘community’ can be discerned. / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The popular tourist destination island of Koh Phi Phi Don, Thailand was heavily affected by the Indian Ocean Tsunami in December 2004, which resulted in a destroyed tourism infrastructure and complete downturn of tourism. Extensive recovery and rebuilding work by emerging community groups, returned locals, international volunteers and Thai government units provided an efficient but hasty reconstruction of the destination. Ethnographic research conducted in the community provided insights into the complex stakeholder interactions and their roles and influences on the reconstruction of the community. The community�s level of vulnerability on Koh Phi Phi Don was influenced by social processes and interactions during the destination�s recovery process as the various stakeholders (e.g. government vs. locals) had differing perceptions of the island�s economic, environmental and social vulnerability. These disputes are grounded in different social time processes, particularly illustrated through land law disputes among locals, landowners and the government. Other factors which influenced the reconstruction of Koh Phi Phi as a tourist destination were pre-tsunami conditions (past overdevelopment), the empowerment of the community, the reconstructed place identity, various anniversary celebrations and the early warning system. A model is suggested to illustrate and discuss Koh Phi Phi Don as a disaster destination, which provides insights into the dynamics which govern a destination�s post-disaster recovery period. Thus, it illustrates how stakeholder interaction is influenced by distinct understandings of the multiple notions of vulnerability. Furthermore, this study establishes essential links between disaster and tourism theories and suggests an extended tourism disaster management framework, which calls for an inclusion of post-recovery processes.

Since the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami devastated coastal areas of several countries in South East Asia, there has been renewed interest in disaster recovery operations. Although governments and aid organizations have increasingly focused on improving living conditions and reducing vulnerability to future disaster events during the recovery period, there has been limited understanding of what effective disaster recovery entails, and a lack of empirical assessments of longer-term recovery initiatives. Researchers, governments and aid organizations alike have increasingly identified the need for a systematic, independent, and replicable framework and approach for monitoring, evaluating and measuring the longer-term relief and recovery operations of major disaster events. Within this context, the research contends that a conceptualization of effective disaster recovery, referred to as ‘resilient disaster recovery’, should be built upon the holistic concepts of vulnerability, resilience and sustainable livelihoods. Using the resilient disaster recovery framework, the research aimed to develop an evaluative strategy to holistically and critically assess disaster recovery efforts. Using a case study of the 2006 Yogyakarta, Indonesia earthquake event, the research examined one long-term recovery effort in order to develop and test the usefulness and applicability of the resilient disaster recovery conceptualization and assessment framework. The research results further contributed to disaster recovery knowledge and academic literature through a refined conceptualization of resilient disaster recovery and further understanding of recovery as a process. The research used qualitative research approaches to examine the opinions and experiences of impacted individuals, households, and communities, as well as key government, academic and humanitarian stakeholders, in order to understand their perceptions of the long-term recovery process. Using the resilient disaster recovery approach, the research found that the recovery programming after the 2006 Yogyakarta earthquake contributed to reductions in visible manifestations of vulnerability, although the root causes of vulnerability were not addressed, and many villagers suffer from ongoing lack of access to assets and resources. While some aspects of resilience were improved, particularly through earthquake-resistant housing structures, resilience in other forms remained the same or decreased. Furthermore, livelihood initiatives did not appear to be successful due to a lack of a holistic approach that matched the skill and capital levels of impacted populations. Using the evidence from the 2006 Yogyakarta recovery effort, the research furthered knowledge and understanding of disaster recovery as a complex and highly dynamic process. The roles of a variety of actors and stakeholders were explored, particularly highlighting the role of civil society and the private sector in facilitating response and recovery. Furthermore, issues of conflict, the context and characteristics of place and scale, and the impact of disasters on income equality were explored. Through this research, an improved understanding of disaster resilient recovery and long-term recovery processes has been highlighted in order to facilitate improved and resilient recovery for future disaster events.

Communication networks are vulnerable to natural as well as man-made disasters. The geographical layout of the network influences the impact of these disasters. It is therefore, necessary to identify areas that could be most affected by a disaster and redesign those parts of the network so that the impact of a disaster has least effect on them. In this work, we assume that disasters which have a circular impact on the network. The work presents two new algorithms, namely the WHF-PG algorithm and the WHF-NPG algorithm, designed to solve the problem of finding the locations of disasters that would have the maximum disruptive effect on the communication infrastructure in terms of capacity.

We discuss queueing systems subject to total disasters. If the time intervals between successive disasters are i.i.d. random variables independent of arrival and service process and arrivals form a Poisson process, then the transient and the asymptotic analysis of such models may be based on Feller's Second Renewal Theorem. Several examples are given: the limiting behavior of M/G/1 in case of exponential disasters and its special cases M/M/1, M/M/1/K and M/M/infinity. (author´s abstract) / Series: Research Report Series / Department of Statistics and Mathematics

This research adds greater dimensions to the understanding of the recovery-aid acquisition process for households in rural communities with a racially heterogeneous and contentious population. The study population is divided into three categories based on ethnicity: Anglo, African-American, and Hispanic. The disaster-recovery process assessed if variations exist the disaster-aid acquisition process of households which correlate with ethnicity. During the investigation, researchers examined if the sources of disaster-aid a household was able to acquire was influenced by ethnicity. Relationships along ethnic lines were also examined in the types of aid acquired by the various groups. These measurements were undertaken to see if different paths to housing recovery resulted in differential rates of recovery. The societal context in which these processes took place has also been considered to establish if it affected the speed and efficiency of the recovery process. This research has helped identify some common problems faced in the disaster-recovery process by resource strapped communities, which also lack the ability to effectively engage vertical and horizontal ties to promote speedy and equitable recovery after a major natural disaster. Results indicate that ethnicity plays a significant role in the disaster-aid acquisition process, but one that varies from expectations developed through a review of previous literature on this subject. These finding may be an indication that the ethnic variations examined in this casestudy are an artifact of social-status and social-integration more so than because of any cultural construct of a particular ethnic group. The overreaching implications of this study show, however, that ethnicity is an important variable in determining the process and availability of major sources of recovery aid in the housing recovery process, particularly in a rural community.

A destructive earthquake is anticipated to occur in Istanbul in the near future. The effects of this earthquake on human, infrastructure and economy are anticipated to be enormous. The Metropolitan Municipality of Istanbul has initiated a disaster plan to mitigate the effects of the disaster. Locating disaster response facilities to execute post-disaster activities and relief operations is a part of this plan. In this study, we address the disaster response and relief facility location problem for Istanbul. Our aim is to study the situation and provide insights on the effects of the number of facilities and their locations. We propose a two-stage distribution system that utilizes existing public facilities as well as the new facilities to be established. We develop a mathematical model that tries to minimize the average distance to the population who need relief services while opening a small number of facilities. We analyze the trade-offs between these two objectives under various circumstances and present the results.

Masteropgave. / Format: PDF. Bibl.

Includes bibliographical references. / Cover title. "February 2003." 4/8/03: Also available via Internet.

Studying hurricane preparedness among the Resident Assistants (RAs) and Residence Life Coordinators (RLCs) at Louisiana State University (LSU) is imperative to assure that the university housing staff is fully equipped when faced with an oncoming threat. This study seeks to fill a gap in research by investigating the influences of preparedness on student housing employees. A survey was developed and the measures were found to be coherent and internally reliable through the use of factor analysis. Based on theory and previous literature, a linear regression model was developed that quantified the relationship between the independent variable of preparedness and general knowledge, past experience, preparation anxiety, threat anxiety, amount of time as a housing employee, amount of time living in Baton Rouge, location of primary address, gender, ethnicity, and car access. Only general knowledge and preparation anxiety were found to influence the preparedness construct significantly (at the 5 percent level). Demographic factors did not influence hurricane preparedness levels of housing staff employees. Results suggest that the university acts as a buffer to student populations from typical vulnerabilities that the regular population experiences in disaster scenarios. This research could be applicable to other university housing staff employees who work at a university that may be frequently impacted by hurricanes.