DR.Ahmed Hany: Environmental Catastrophes Management

There was an increase in the catastrophes in the last few years all over the world but it is noticeable that the victims are much less in the advanced countries than in the developing countries.

Whether the causes are the better construction of building according to the codes, better preparedness and/or better prediction and expectation; the poor countries lack all that.

The environmental catastrophes may be due to changes in the biosphere, like earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, storms, tsunami, draughts, climate changes like freezing or hot weather and forest fires.

They cannot be avoided but they could be managed to decrease losses and victims.

The other face of the coin is the induced catastrophes or man-made catastrophes. To begin with terrorism the long list nearly includes most of life actions.

Improper maintenance in factories especially chemical factories and nuclear plants may kill and injure citizens the amount of a city inhabitants.

The consequent air pollution affects wide area about the size of a continent. Drowned fuel containers kill the sea life and pollute shores.

As a matter of fact all man-induced disasters could be predicted and prevented.

The expectation of the occurrence of catastrophes by the scenarios then statistical prediction of these expectations are done by brain storms of a group of experts.

Then the cause-effect method is thoroughly done to define risks that may be disastrous.

Delphi method to devise solutions to prevent and to deal with these catastrophes and applying the 20/80 rule i.e. 20 percent of causes are responsible for 80 percent of problems; help to prevent most disasters and allows the disaster management team to have a plan to safeguard the community against the man-made disasters.

It is easier said than done and Egypt can help Africans and other developing countries to train their teams in the Egyptian institutes.

To prevent disasters and to properly deal with them so that less people are badly affected, the nation should stress on maintenance and training.

The periodical maintenance of buildings, factories, transportation vehicles, bridges, roads and nearly all ma-made structures prevent the sudden collapse.

Training people on how to behave during disasters is of due importance to keep them safe if sudden accident happens.

In fact training of people should start in the early childhood in schools.

And gradually it will be part of their subconscious so that if disaster happens they will automatically do the proper actions.

The national disaster plan is the sum of all disaster plans of regional areas and their constructions; besides the scenarios of the natural disasters plans.

The methods of approach and risqué teams have to understand all details of the different plans devised for different situations whether the disaster is natural or accidental.

If a disaster occurred the first duty of disaster management team is to know the size of the affected region and to predict how many victims need urgent treatment and how many people are affected and the degree of affection.

After the rapid scanning and gathering by every mean from persons’ stories to sophisticate satellite photos the manager of the team decides about approach and the amount of aid needed for relief.

The number of the dead and injured determine and define the aid and whether the regional authorities can manage or it needs help from neighboring regions, the nation or even the international community.

The hospitals capacities in the area and the equipment needed and how to evacuate people may be the first duty.

While risqué teams work on the site the authorities take decisions about the homeless people that lost their homes and belongings.

Usually authorities move people to a nearby camp. However in poor countries sometimes even camps could be present and people are left for their destiny.

Proper planning for logistics and supply chain help people and avoid many interpersonal problems in the camps.

Usually after catastrophes people sympathizes with victims but as time passes the problems of the crowdedness in the camp become clear for both the refugees and locals.

In fact camps need good management not to be shanty towns with all their problems for inhabitants of the camp and locals.

Authorities should decide if the camp will be temporary of it will take long time for reconstruction.

The managers of the camps should know how to keep security and to solve the problems.

The good organizing makes the difference between failure and success.

Food supplies and distribution, and treating people are the two main problems facing any management.

Waste collection and removal is another problem that may add to the deterioration of refugees and neighboring locals.

If authorities for a reason or another could not reconstruct the damaged area soon then integration plans should be devised and executed not to let the camp be a shanty town.

About twenty per cent of refugees will have psychological problems.

The basics of these problems are the anxiety, depression and the post stress syndrome.

That leads to aggressiveness and violent behavior.

Integration of refugees in the nearby communities depend on rehabilitation and employment with allowing kids to go schools.

As any dramatic life stories some good is present in the bad.

The post-catastrophe period is a suitable time for changing people behavior in the nation as a whole and to retrain them on behaving properly during future crises.

The authorities should be sincere and transparent about analyzing the success and failure of the plans and actions taken during the crisis so that pitfalls could be avoided in the future.

At the same time recent advantages of reconstruction could be applied to avoid future catastrophe.

Conclusion:

No one can predict a natural catastrophe but man-made catastrophes could be predicted and prevented by maintenance and training of people.

After the catastrophe authorities should decide if the refugee camps will be temporary or permanent. Integration of refugees in the neighboring community needs careful approach.

Reconstruction of damaged areas is an opportunity for modernization.

The post-catastrophe period is an opportunity to change people behavior and to train them on how to behave during crisis.

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