Forensic Analysis of Historical Disasters to Develop Quantifiable Multi-hazard Impact Chains Models

To develop quantifiable multi-hazard impact chains, it is essential to base the analysis on historical data. Currently, available disaster databases often focus only on single hazards and direct impacts. They do not enable the attribution of the impact caused by hazard interactions and do not adequately describe the risk pathways from root causes to resulting losses. The Post Disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA) approach has become standard practice to determine the physical damages, economic losses, and recovery costs after major disasters. However, it is not a straightforward method to estimate the impacts and losses of future events. Forensic investigations of disasters (e.g. FORIN3) have identified the need to characterize the systemic, structural underlying root causes and risk drivers at the global, national and local levels. Whereas the use of historical disaster data is essential, the prevailing view that the “past is the key to the future” should be supported by rapidly changing economic, social and environmental conditions. We apply a combination of forensic analysis approaches to a set of learning case studies (selected past disaster events) to analyse and apply the complexity of disaster impacts in different contexts, also tapping knowledge, data and information from earlier European projects.