An analysis of the evolution of hydrometeorological extremes in newspapers: the case of Catalonia, 1982–2006

Llasat, María Carmen; Llasat-Botija, Montserrat; Barnolas, M.; López, Laura; Altava-Ortiz, V.

doi:10.5194/nhess-9-1201-2009

Cited by 73 publications

(66 citation statements)

References 31 publications

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“…Newspaper data allow either investigation or complete information of past landslides (Cuesta et al, 1999;Devoli et al, 2007;Kuriakose et al, 2009), floods (Rappaport, 2000;Agasse, 2003;Maples and Tiefenbacher, 2009;Adhikari et al, 2010), or both types of phenomena (Hilker et al, 2009). Collected data allow either analysis of the evolution of societal hazard perception (Llasat et al, 2009) or the estimation of direct financial damage as well as fatalities and injured people (FitzGerald et al, 2010). However, some limitations must be taken into account:…”

Section: Methodological Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%

Damaging events along roads during bad weather periods: a case study in Calabria (Italy)

Petrucci

Pasqua

2012

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract. The study focuses on circumstances that affect people during periods of bad weather conditions characterised by winds, rainfall, landslides, flooding, and storm surges. A methodological approach and its application to a study area in southern Italy are presented here. A 10-yr database was generated by mining data from a newspaper. Damaging agents were sorted into five types: flood, urban flooding, landslide, wind, and storm surge. Damage to people occurred in 126 cases, causing 13 victims, 129 injured and about 782 people involved but not injured.For cases of floods, urban flooding and landslides, the analysis does not highlight straightforward relationships between rainfall and damage to people, even if the events showed different features according to the months of occurrence. The events occurring between May and October were characterised by concentrated and intense rainfall, and between May and July, the highest values of hourly (103 mm on the average) and monthly rainfall (114 mm on the average) were recorded. Urban flooding and flash floods were the most common damaging agents: injured, involved people and more rarely, cases with victims were reported.Between November and April, the highest number of events was recorded. Rainfall presented longer durations and hourly and sub-hourly rainfall were lower than those recorded between May and October. Landslides were the most frequent damaging agents but the highest number of cases with victims, which occurred between November and January, were mainly related to floods and urban flooding.Motorists represent the totality of the victims; 84 % of the people were injured and the whole of people involved. All victims were men, and the average age was 43 yr. The primary cause of death was drowning caused by floods, and the second was trauma suffered in car accidents caused by urban flooding. The high number of motorists rescued in submerged cars reveals an underestimation of danger in the case of floods, often increased by the sense of security related to the familiarity of the road. In contrast, in the cases of people involved in landslides, when there was enough time to realise the potential risk, people behaved appropriately to avoid negative consequences. Of the victims, 50 % were killed along fast-flowing roads; this may be related to the high speed limit in force on these roads, as a car's speed reduces the reaction time of a driver's response to an unexpected situation, whatever the damaging agent is. These results can be used in local information/education campaigns to both increase risk awareness and promote self-protective behaviours.Moreover, the mapping of damaging effects pointed out the regional sectors in which the high frequency of the events suggests further planning of in-depth examinations, which can individuate the critical points and local regulator interventions that might change damage incidences in the future.

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Section: Methodological Approachmentioning

confidence: 99%

Damaging events along roads during bad weather periods: a case study in Calabria (Italy)

Petrucci

Pasqua

2012

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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“…In the western Mediterranean region, recent studies show an increase in vulnerability mainly related to the population displacements towards the coastal regions, where flash floods are frequent (Llasat et al, 2009a. The more populated a region is, the more social impact a weather event causes in it.…”

Section: Events' Revisionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The role of different factors related to social impact of heavy rain events: considerations about the intensity thresholds in densely populated areas

Barbería

Amaro

Aran

et al. 2014

Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci.

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Abstract. In the assessment of social impact caused by meteorological events, factors of different natures need to be considered. Not only does hazard itself determine the impact that a severe weather event has on society, but also other features related to vulnerability and exposure.The requests of data related to insurance claims received in meteorological services proved to be a good indicator of the social impact that a weather event causes, according to studies carried out by the Social Impact Research Group, created within the framework of the MEDEX project. Taking these requests as proxy data, diverse aspects connected to the impact of heavy rain events have been studied.The rainfall intensity, in conjunction with the population density, has established itself as one of the key factors in social impact studies. One of the conclusions we obtained is that various thresholds of rainfall should be applied for areas of varying populations. In this study, the role of rainfall intensity has been analysed for a highly populated urban area like Barcelona. A period without significant population changes has been selected for the study to minimise the effects linked to vulnerability and exposure modifications. First, correlations between rainfall recorded in different time intervals and requests were carried out. Afterwards, a method to include the intensity factor in the social impact index was suggested based on return periods given by intensity-durationfrequency (IDF) curves.

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“…To find data on the damaging effects of historical DHEs, newspapers are the most commonly used data source [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17], even if data can be found in many other types of sources [18][19][20][21][22]; the actual data availability generally may vary from one country to another. The restrictions affecting historical data are widely described in the literature and concern the completeness of the historical series, the exact localization in both time and space of the effects, the uncertainty concerning the number of people involved, and the reliability of the information sources [4,[23][24][25][26][27][28].…”

Section: Damage Data Collectionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impact of Damaging Geo-Hydrological Events and Population Development in Calabria, Southern Italy

Petrucci

Pasqua

Polemio

2013

Water

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Damaging geo-Hydrogeological Events (DHEs) are defined as the occurrence of destructive phenomena (such as landslides and floods) that can cause damage to people and goods during periods of bad weather. These phenomena should be analyzed together as they actually occur because their interactions can both amplify the damage and obstruct emergency management. The occurrence of DHEs depends on the interactions between climatic and geomorphological features: except for long-term climatic changes, these interactions can be considered constant, and for this reason, some areas are systematically affected. However, damage scenarios can change; events that occurred in the past could presently cause different effects depending on the modifications that occurred in the geographical distribution of vulnerable elements. We analyzed a catastrophic DHE that in 1951 affected an area 3700 km 2 wide, located in Calabria (southern Italy), with four-day cumulative rainfall exceeding 300 mm and return periods of daily rain exceeding 500 Y. It resulted in 101 victims and 4500 homeless individuals. The probability that a similar event will happen again in the future is assessed using the return period of the triggering rainfall, whereas the different anthropogenic factors are taken into account by means of the population densities at the time of the event and currently. The result is a classification of regional municipalities according to the probability that events such as the one analyzed will occur again in the future and the possible effects of this event on the current situation.

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An analysis of the evolution of hydrometeorological extremes in newspapers: the case of Catalonia, 1982–2006

Cited by 73 publications

References 31 publications

Damaging events along roads during bad weather periods: a case study in Calabria (Italy)

Damaging events along roads during bad weather periods: a case study in Calabria (Italy)

The role of different factors related to social impact of heavy rain events: considerations about the intensity thresholds in densely populated areas

Impact of Damaging Geo-Hydrological Events and Population Development in Calabria, Southern Italy

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