World Bank, Italy collaborate on disaster response

The Italian Civil Protection Department and the World Bank are using experience gained from the response to a deadly earthquake in Italy earlier this year in efforts they said they hope will help other countries prepare for natural disasters.

The organizations signed a memorandum of understanding Wednesday to collaborate further on lessons that can be taken from the April earthquake in L’Aquila, which killed about 300 people and left some 40,000 homeless.

Among efforts already undertaken, the two groups have compiled an upcoming publication on rebuilding after disasters that draws on experiences in the L’Aquila quake.

Tropical Cyclone Phyan Hits India’s Western Coast Near Mumbai

Tropical Cyclone Phyan hit India’s western coast near the commercial capital, Mumbai, prompting evacuations and storm warnings.

Phyan crossed the coast between Mumbai and Alibag, to the south of the city, between 3:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. local time and was forecast to track north-northeastward, the India Meteorological Department said on its Web site.

The system was likely to weaken from a deep depression to a depression during the night, after heavy rain and winds gusting to 70 kilometers (44 miles) per hour batter the coast of northern Maharashtra and southern Gujarat states, the department said in an advisory that was timed at 7 p.m. and posted at about 8:30 p.m.

Residents of slums in low-lying areas of Mumbai were told to evacuate, Mahesh Narvekar, the head of disaster management at Municipal Corp. of Greater Mumbai, said by phone. An alert for strong winds and rain was issued for all 24 wards of the city, which has a population of 18 million.

ANALYSIS-Can we predict next world crisis?

A year after the implosion of Lehman Brothers sent world markets into turmoil, the question of where the next global shock will come from — and whether it can be predicted and prepared for — has never been so urgent.

What makes the issue particularly difficult is that many of the events catastrophic enough to cause a major crisis — known as “fat tail risks” or as “Black Swans” by trader and author Nassim Nicholas Taleb — come from outside the realm of finance.

To be able to forecast what the next global shock will be, we need to be able to make predictions about geopolitics, war, terrorism, extreme weather events, earthquakes and pandemics.

In their book this year on fat tail risks, Ian Bremmer and Preston Keat of political risk consultancy Eurasia Group noted that they pose fundamental problems for accurate prediction.

Fat tails, they wrote, “represent the risk that a particular event will occur that appears so catastrophically damaging, unlikely to happen, and difficult to predict, that many of us choose simply to ignore it. Until it happens.”

A growing body of theory and evidence suggests that making accurate forecasts about rare catastrophic events is inherently impossible. But it also suggests a practical solution to mitigate the dangers — detailed scenario-planning by imaginative analysts who do not cling too tightly to mathematical models of reality.

DART-THROWING CHIMPANZEES

Whatever analysts attempt to forecast — the economy, the weather, the progress of epidemics, geopolitical change — the key problems are the same. Systematic forecasting requires a model that approximates reality. But is this feasible?

A disaster that could have been less painful

With flooding caused by Typhoon Morakot wreaking severe damage in southern Taiwan, experts must now consider how such a disaster could have been repeated 50 years after the notorious flooding of Aug. 7, 1959. Over the past two years, Taiwan’s ability to handle disasters has deteriorated. Compared with their disaster response measures last year, the incompetent bureaucrats in President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) government have made no progress.

First, Ma criticized the Central Weather Bureau for “misleading” the government last year, and he has done so again this time.

Second, flooding caused by heavy rains damaged central and southern Taiwan in late May and early June last year. Ma, however, was busy having a health check, acting like a zhainan (stay-at-home youth) and avoiding the front line. After severe criticism, he finally inspected the disaster area in mid-June.

But to avoid losing face because people might think he was admitting to making a mistake, Ma claimed he was simply visiting old friends.

On the evening that Typhoon Morakot struck, Ma attended the wedding of Taiwanese poet Chan Che (詹澈) and his Chinese wife. Chan was a celebrity among the “red shirts” who protested against former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁).

Third, in response to last year’s flooding, Council of Agriculture Minister Chen Wu-hsiung (陳武雄) said total losses were “only” about NT$20 million (US$608,000). Last Saturday, the media reported that former vice premier Chiou I-jen’s (邱義仁) watermelon farm in Kaohsiung County alone suffered losses of about NT$400,000 from Typhoon Morakot. Yet on the same day, the council estimated that losses in all of Taiwan amounted to only about NT$5 million.

A Million in China Evacuate Ahead of Typhoon

Typhoon Morakot slammed into the east coast of China on Sunday, packing winds up to 111 miles an hour, destroying hundreds of homes and forcing one million people to flee.

A 4-year-old child was reported dead in Wenzhou, a city of nearly 1.4 million in Zhejiang Province, where officials said the storm had leveled more than 300 homes. The child was among five people buried when the winds collapsed five adjacent houses.

The authorities said that the storm was whipping up waves as high at 26 feet in the East China Sea and in the strait between mainland China and Taiwan, which was battered by the typhoon on Saturday.

In Taiwan, which suffered its worst flooding in a half-century, three people were killed and 31 were missing and feared dead, Taiwan’s Disaster Relief Center told The Associated Press on Sunday.

Sixteen of the missing were from one family that had lived in a makeshift house in Kaohsiung, in the island’s south, that was swept away by the waters.

The island was swamped by more than 80 inches of rain, according to the Central Weather Bureau. In southeastern Taitung County, a six-story hotel collapsed into a river after torrential rains eroded its foundation, but officials said all 300 guests had been safely evacuated.

More than 170,000 people remained without power on Monday, the government said.

The typhoon, the eighth of the season, hit the Chinese mainland at 4:20 p.m. on Sunday at Xiapu County, in north Fujian Province. China’s state-run Xinhua news service said that more than 490,000 people had been moved to safety in Fujian, and 48,000 boats summoned back to harbor.

Pet care 101: Disaster planning can save your pet in an emergency

Does anyone really expect, let alone plan for, that one day when their home, vehicle, possessions and all means of communication will suddenly be gone?

It happens to many people every year during hurricane, tornado season and many other disasters. No matter where you live, the unexpected can occur. Disasters come in all forms. From blizzards to wildfir, earthquakes to hurricanes, terrorist attacks to floods, emergencies occur in all parts of the country, which means that everyone should have a disaster plan for their family including one for pets.

You can (and should) take them with you

With pets in more than 60 percent of American households, weathering a disaster requires having a plan that includes them. Be prepared to take pets with you if evacuation orders are issued. If it isn’t safe for you, it isn’t safe for them. If you are ordered to shelter in place, bring your pets inside with you.

Pet owners can reduce their animal’s chances of being at risk during a disaster by following the suggestions below.

Things you can do right now:

Put a collar with visible identification on your pets, including indoor only pets.
Take pictures of you with your pets for id purposes.
Create a pet emergency kit (see below) and refresh the items every few months.
Talk to your neighbors about how they can help your pets if you are not at home when disaster strikes.
Create a list of hotels that allow pets. Plan on evacuating about 100 miles inland.
Pet emergency kits should include:

Disaster Housing Plans Need Work, DHS Official Says

Should another Katrina — or an earthquake or a tornado — hit the nation, putting a roof over the heads of the victims is a problem that the Homeland Security Department’s watchdog calls “a work in progress.”

“I’m sure we can handle large disasters, but we’re not ready to handle another [hurricane] Katrina-like disaster where we have 350,000 to 500,000 homes destroyed across the Gulf area,” said Richard Skinner, inspector general for the department.

However, the responsibility for disaster preparedness doesn’t rest solely with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, he cautioned. “People always turn to FEMA,” he told the House Homeland Security Committee last week. “FEMA is a coordinator. They’re just one cog in the wheel. . . . They’re a conduit of funds.”

According to Skinner, FEMA can work with state and local governments to help fund them to get prepared and identify mitigation measures they should take — and federal, state and local government all share responsibility.

“If we start investing in our infrastructure, start investing in preparedness and start investing in mitigation, it’s going to lessen the likelihood that we’re going to have a catastrophic event,” he said. “And if we do, we’ll be better prepared for it.”

Uyghurs: China’s remote Muslim minority

China’s remote Xinjiang region, hit by violence that officials say has left dozens dead, has seen a recent surge in unrest involving ethnic Uyghurs.

The Uyghurs are a mainly Sunni Muslim group found throughout Xinjiang, a vast and arid territory that straddles the ancient Silk Road trading route and forms China’s western borders with Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Pakistan.

With a distinct culture and Turkic-based language, Uyghurs are guaranteed equal rights and limited autonomy under China’s constitution, however ethnic tensions run deep. Some Uyghurs feel threatened by the steady influx of migrants from China’s overcrowded east.

Millions of Han Chinese, the country’s dominant ethnic group, have migrated into Xinjiang over the past 60 years, prompting complaints that they dominate local politics, culture and commerce at the Uyghurs’ expense.

The dissatisfaction has turned violent at times, including a major flashpoint in 1992 when several buses were bombed in Urumqi.

A look at world’s deadliest air disasters

Yemenia Airbus 310 enroute to the Comoros Islands crashes into the Indian Ocean with 153 people on board.

June 1, 2009: Air France Airbus A330 runs into thunderstorms and crashes into Atlantic Ocean en route from Rio de Janeiro to Paris, killing 228 people on board.

Feb. 19, 2003: Iranian Revolutionary Guard military plane crashes into a mountain. 275 dead.

May 25, 2002: China Airlines Boeing 747 breaks apart midair and crashes into the Taiwan Strait. 225 dead.

Nov. 12, 2001: American Airlines Airbus A300 crashes after takeoff from JFK Airport into the New York City borough of Queens. 265 dead, including people on the ground.

Oct. 31, 1999: EgyptAir Boeing 767 crashes off Nantucket; the NTSB blames actions by the co-pilot. 217 dead.

Sept. 2, 1998: Swissair MD-11 crashes off Nova Scotia. 229 dead.

Feb. 16, 1998: China Airlines Airbus A300 crashes on landing at airport in Taipei, Taiwan. 203 dead.

Sept. 26, 1997: Garuda Indonesia Airbus A300 crashes near airport in Medan, Indonesia. 234 dead.

Aug. 6, 1997: Korean Air Boeing 747-300 crashes on landing in Guam. 228 dead.

Emergency drill tests region’s response to major disasters

City police and more than 20 emergency agencies juggled the threat of explosions and challenges of real-time decision making Thursday in one of the largest disaster drills ever mounted in Cumberland County.
The four-hour drill called out, in addition to Millville police, fire and rescue units, their municipal and state counterparts from as close as Vineland and as far as Atlantic City and Trenton. Atlantic City and state police sent bomb disposal units, complete with robots.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security gave the county Office of Emergency Management $42,000 to mount the anti-terrorism exercise, which will keep participants comparing notes and writing reports for months.

“I think it is a fantastic exercise,” county Office of Emergency Management Coordinator Joe Sever said.

While there were some blips in the drill — held behind Lakeside Middle School — consultants who wrote the drill script and oversaw a post-drill critiquing were happy with the result. County, city and other agency officials generally were positive, too.

Millville police Capt. Wayne Smith said the drill started off right with the opening actions from the first two patrolmen on scene, Steve Jones and Manny Morales.

They were greeted by “wounded,” panicked men and women fleeing a bus where a passenger had set off a bomb.

Smith said the officers grasped the magnitude of the event and reported it accurately, allowing a chain of contacts to start among local, county and state “first responders.”

The basis of the script was a Lion Trailways bus had stopped at Wheaton Plaza on North High Street, where a passenger was found to have an explosive device.

The North Sharp Street school stood in as the shopping center for logistical reasons.