Dataset Information

Assessing Risks from Cyclones for Human Lives and Livelihoods in the Coastal Region of Bangladesh.

ABSTRACT: As a disaster prone country, Bangladesh is regularly hit by natural hazards, including devastating cyclones, such as in 1970, 1991 and 2007. Although the number of cyclones' fatalities reduced from 0.3 million in 1970 to a few thousand or fewer in recent events, loss of lives and impact on livelihoods remains a concern. It depends on the meteorological characteristics of cyclone and the general vulnerability and capacity of the exposed population. In that perspective, a spatially explicit risk assessment is an essential step towards targeted disaster risk reduction. This study aims at analyzing the spatial variation of the different factors contributing to the risk for coastal communities at regional scale, including the distribution of the hazards, exposure, vulnerability and capacity. An exploratory factor analysis method is used to map vulnerability contrasts between local administrative units. Indexing and ranking using geospatial techniques are used to produce maps of exposure, hazard, vulnerability, capacities and risk. Results show that vulnerable populations and exposed areas are distributed along the land sea boundary, islands and major inland rivers. The hazard, assessed from the density of historical cyclone paths, is highest in the southwestern part of the coast. Whereas cyclones shelters are shown to properly serve the most vulnerable populations as priority evacuation centers, the overall pattern of capacity accounting for building quality and road network shows a more complex pattern. Resultant risk maps also provide a reasonable basis from which to take further structural measures to minimize loss of lives in the upcoming cyclones.

SUBMITTER: Quader MA

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5580535 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Assessing Risks from Cyclones for Human Lives and Livelihoods in the Coastal Region of Bangladesh.

Quader Mohammad Abdul MA Khan Amanat Ullah AU Kervyn Matthieu M

International journal of environmental research and public health 20170725 8

As a disaster prone country, Bangladesh is regularly hit by natural hazards, including devastating cyclones, such as in 1970, 1991 and 2007. Although the number of cyclones' fatalities reduced from 0.3 million in 1970 to a few thousand or fewer in recent events, loss of lives and impact on livelihoods remains a concern. It depends on the meteorological characteristics of cyclone and the general vulnerability and capacity of the exposed population. In that perspective, a spatially explicit risk a ...[more]

PMID: 28757550

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Project description:BackgroundTropical cyclone epidemiology can be advanced through exposure assessment methods that are comprehensive and consistent across space and time, as these facilitate multiyear, multistorm studies. Further, an understanding of patterns in and between exposure metrics that are based on specific hazards of the storm can help in designing tropical cyclone epidemiological research.Objectivesa) Provide an open-source data set for tropical cyclone exposure assessment for epidemiological research; and b) investigate patterns and agreement between county-level assessments of tropical cyclone exposure based on different storm hazards.MethodsWe created an open-source data set with data at the county level on exposure to four tropical cyclone hazards: peak sustained wind, rainfall, flooding, and tornadoes. The data cover all eastern U.S. counties for all land-falling or near-land Atlantic basin storms, covering 1996-2011 for all metrics and up to 1988-2018 for specific metrics. We validated measurements against other data sources and investigated patterns and agreement among binary exposure classifications based on these metrics, as well as compared them to use of distance from the storm's track, which has been used as a proxy for exposure in some epidemiological studies.ResultsOur open-source data set was typically consistent with data from other sources, and we present and discuss areas of disagreement and other caveats. Over the study period and area, tropical cyclones typically brought different hazards to different counties. Therefore, when comparing exposure assessment between different hazard-specific metrics, agreement was usually low, as it also was when comparing exposure assessment based on a distance-based proxy measurement and any of the hazard-specific metrics.DiscussionOur results provide a multihazard data set that can be leveraged for epidemiological research on tropical cyclones, as well as insights that can inform the design and analysis for tropical cyclone epidemiological research. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP6976.

Dataset Information

Assessing Risks from Cyclones for Human Lives and Livelihoods in the Coastal Region of Bangladesh.

Publications

Assessing Risks from Cyclones for Human Lives and Livelihoods in the Coastal Region of Bangladesh.

Similar Datasets

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