Future resilience and adaptation

Everything a place does **before** a geophysical hazard to **lower human vulnerability** (prediction, warning, zoning, resilient design).

How **exposed** and **unable to cope** a population is when a hazard strikes — the risk of death, injury and damage.

**Prediction & monitoring**, **warning & evacuation**, **land-use zoning**, and **resilient building design**.

Instruments (seismometers, GPS, gas sensors) detect warning signs, giving time to **warn and evacuate** before an eruption.

Maps the hazard and **bans building** in exposed zones (lahar paths, low coast), so fewer people sit in the danger zone.

Hazard-proof construction (cross-bracing, lava walls, slope gabions) keeps buildings standing so people survive.

Unlike many eruptions, quakes give **no reliable warning signs** before they strike — so warning systems offer only seconds.

Chile's **larger** quake killed far fewer because it **enforced building codes**; Haiti did not. Design works if a place can afford it.

Early warning saved many lives, but the tsunami **topped the sea walls** and over 18,000 died — defences fail if the hazard exceeds the plan.

Hazard maps warned of lahars, but the **warning was not acted on** and ~23,000 died — prediction only works if communicated and heeded.

Engineering (barriers, channels, seawater spraying) that **redirects slow lava** away from towns — e.g. Etna and Heimaey 1973.

A range of strategies with **named evidence**, a **balanced** view of limits, and a **judgement** tied to cost and development level.

The **capacity of people and places to absorb a hazard, recover, and adapt** so future events cause less harm.

How **exposed and susceptible** a community is to loss when a hazard strikes; resilience reduces it.

**Response** = immediate emergency actions (rescue, aid); **recovery** = the longer rebuilding and restoring of normal life.

**Pre-event** = before the hazard (prediction, codes, preparation); **post-event** = after (rescue, aid, reconstruction).

Coordinated search and rescue; communications tech (drones/satellite); plus medical aid, reconstruction/retrofitting, insurance, hazard mapping.

**Drones** find survivors where roads are cut; **satellite/remote sensing** maps the worst-hit zones; **social media** crowd-sources need.

Poor building quality, weak governance and limited services gave **high vulnerability** (~220,000 deaths) and a slow, aid-dependent recovery.

Strict codes limited quake deaths, but the **tsunami overtopped sea walls** and caused the Fukushima crisis - resilience improved via re-zoning the coast.

A Colombian eruption whose **lahar buried Armero** (~23,000 deaths) after warnings were ignored - a failure of preparation and response.

Population pressure and urbanisation put more people on fragile slopes/coasts; climate change brings heavier rain triggering more mass movement.

Slope stabilisation, land-use zoning, building codes, prediction/warning and education reduce vulnerability faster than exposure grows.

Balanced weighing (raise vs lower, or works vs fails), named events with data, accurate terms, and a justified conclusion.