Expert details role of social sciences in disasters

Havidan Rodriguez, director of UD’s Disaster Research Center

12:17 p.m., Nov. 16, 2004--“A disaster goes well beyond the physical impact of the event,” Havidan Rodriguez, director of UD’s Disaster Research Center, told those attending the Bach Lunch Series presentation Wednesday, Nov. 10, in Bayard Sharp Hall.

“So, it’s important to study these events from social and behavioral aspects,” which is what the Disaster Research Center (DRC) does, he said. “We investigate how communities are impacted, respond and recover from these events and how our organizations and institutions in the affected areas can help.”

In defining what is a disaster is, Rodriguez said, “It’s an event identified in time and space; it restrains society’s normal activities and functions; it results in death, wounded and extensive damage; it overwhelms a society’s ability to respond.”

There are factors that increase a society’s vulnerability to disasters, such as population growth, a very young or very old population, migration and urbanization, economic development, poverty and inequality and the construction of high-rise structures.

For example, during the 2004 hurricane season, Florida was hit with four serious hurricanes within six weeks. On Aug. 13, Charley, a category-four hurricane, hit the coast killing 31 people. Three weeks later, Sept. 5, Frances killed 33 people, and on Sept. 16, Ivan hit taking 54 lives. Jeanne was the last to slam Florida, killing eight people. Their total impact on Florida exceeded even that of Hurricane Andrew in 1992, the most destructive United States hurricane on record.

But, even so, Rodriguez said, the four together were not as lethal as Jeanne was to the island of Haiti, where poverty and inequality magnified the hurricane’s impact. The death toll there was between 1,516 and 3,006, with 2,620 injured and 900 missing. In Florida, Jeanne was only a tropical storm killing eight people, but, in Haiti, its 100-mile-per-hour winds left 300,000 homeless.

Even more deadly was the earthquake that leveled the city of Bam, Iran, killing 30,000 and leaving 75,000 homeless. Some 85 percent of the structures in that city were destroyed or damaged, he said.

Rodriguez said his research focuses on how poverty and inequality affect an area’s ability to cope with disasters.

DRC is the oldest entity in the world specializing in the social ramifications of disasters, Rodriquez said. In its 41-year history, the center has sponsored 600 field trips in the aftermath of disasters throughout the U.S., Japan, Mexico, Canada, Italy, Turkey and Puerto Rico; carried out systematic studies on a broad range of disaster types, including hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, tornadoes, hazardous chemical incidents and plane crashes; and organized several multinational research conferences.

“We have the largest library collection focusing on the social sciences of disasters in the world,” he said.

The projects the center is working on include multi-organizational coordination and response systems in emergencies, such as the Sept. 11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. “We had people at Ground Zero collecting information on how institutions and organizations reacted to the attack, and we now have publications focusing on the outcomes of that research.

“We’re looking at coastal regions, such as Puerto Rico for disaster vulnerability; assessing whether technology increases preparation and response time, communicating preparedness and awareness, identifying urban search and rescue teams to respond during disasters,” Rodriguez said, inviting everyone to access the center’s web site at [www.udel.edu/DRC/index.html].

Next in the Bach’s Lunch series will be outstanding UD flute students who will play “Music from Across the Pond” at 12:10 p.m., Wednesday, Nov. 17. Featured will be solo flute repertoire by composers from far away.

Article by Barbara Garrison
Photo by Kevin Quinlan

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