Meeting report: Workshop on reduction and predictability of natural disasters

Technical Report · Mon Apr 21 04:00:00 EDT 1997

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/481603· OSTI ID:481603

Rundle, J; Klein, W; Turcotte, D

Natural hazards such as earthquakes and severe floods are a continual menace to large segments of the population worldwide. Recently the United Nations has focused attention on this global problem by declaring the 90`s the Decade of Natural Hazard Reduction. In addition to the obvious threat to human life natural hazards can cause severe economic hardship locally and, in an ever more complex and interactive world economy, dislocations that are felt in areas far beyond the region of a specific event. To address these concerns a workshop on Reduction and Predictability of Natural Disasters was held at the Santa Fe Institute on January 5--9, 1994. The Santa Fe Institute was originally founded in 1985 to study the emergent properties of complex nonlinear systems seen in a diversity of fields, from physical science to economics to biology. During the workshop, which brought together 25 geologists, geophysicists, hydrologists, physicists, and mathematicians, a wide variety of natural disasters and hazards were considered. These include earthquakes, landslides, floods, tsunamis, hurricanes, and tornadoes. The general them of the meeting was the application of the techniques of statistical mechanics to problems in the earth sciences.

• Research Organization: Santa Fe Inst., NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Energy Research, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: FG03-94ER14425
• OSTI ID: 481603
• Report Number(s): DOE/ER/14425--T1; ON: DE97006055
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

45 MILITARY TECHNOLOGY, WEAPONRY, AND NATIONAL DEFENSE
ALGORITHMS
CIVIL DEFENSE
COMPUTERIZED SIMULATION
FORECASTING
MEETINGS
NATURAL DISASTERS
STATISTICAL MECHANICS
STATISTICS