UNIT IV

ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION
DISASTER MANAGEMENT
Dr. D. Balaji
Associate Professor
Department of Chemical Engineering

Learning Objective
This lecture will help you understand
Earthquakes
Floods
Landslides
Cyclones

Disaster Management
A disaster is a natural or manmade event which results in
widespread human loss, loss of livelihood, property and life.
Geological processes like earthquakes, volcanoes, floods and
landslides are normal natural events which have resulted in the
formation of the earth.
They are, however, disastrous in their impacts when they
affect human settlements.
Human societies have witnessed a large number of such
natural hazards in different parts of the world.

Earthquakes
Earthquakes occur due to sudden movements of earths crust.
The earths crust has several tectonic plates of solid rock
which slowly move along their boundaries.
When friction prevents these plates from slipping, stress builds
up and results in sudden fractures which can occur along the
boundaries of the plates or fault lines (planes of weakness)
within the plates.
This causes earthquakes, the violent, short-term vibrations in
the earth.
The point on a fault at which the first movement occurs during
an earthquake is called the epicenter.

 The severity of an earthquake is generally measured by its

magnitude on Richter Scale.
Richter Scale
Severity of earthquake
Less than 4
Insignificant
4 - 4.9
Minor
5 - 5.9
Damaging
6 - 6.9
Destructive
7 - 7.9
Major
More than 8
Great

 The largest earthquake ever recorded occurred on May 22,

1960 in Chile with the estimated magnitude of 9.5 on Richter
Scale, affecting 90,000 square miles and killing 6,000 people.
The devastating earthquake in jan 2001which hit Bhuj Town in
Gujarat had caused massive damage, killing 20,000-30,000
people and leaving many injured.
It had an energy equivalent to a 5.3 megaton hydrogen bomb.

Damages to BHUJ_Gujarat

 Earthquake-generated water waves called tsunamis can

severely affect coastal areas.
These giant sea swells can move at a speed upto 1000 Km/hr
or even faster.
While approaching the sea shore they may often reach 15 m or
sometimes upto 65 m in height and cause massive devastation
in coastal areas.

 Anthropogenic activities can also cause or enhance the

frequency of earthquakes. Three such activities identified are:
(a) Impoundment of huge quantities of water in the lake behind a
big dam.
(b) Under ground nuclear testing.
(c) Deep well disposal of liquid waste.

Preventive measures:
Damage to property and life can be prevented by constructing
earthquake-resistant buildings in the earthquake prone zones or
seismic areas.
For this, the structures are heavily reinforced, weak spots are
strategically placed in the building that can absorb vibrations
from the rest of the building.
Wooden houses are preferred in earthquake prone areas as in
Japan

Floods
Due to heavy rains or sudden snow melt the quantity of water
in streams exceeds their capacity and water overflows the
banks and causes inundation of the surrounding land. This
situation is called flood.
A flood generally doesnt damage property or cause causalities
to an extent as done by other natural disasters.
However, it causes a great economic loss and health related
problems due to widespread contamination.
Virtually anything the flood water touches gets contaminated,
posing serious threat to health due to outbreak of epidemics.

 Human activities have been the main causes for increasing the
severity and frequency of floods.
Construction of roads, parking space and buildings that cover
the earths surface hardly allows infiltration of water into the
soil and speeds up the runoff.
Clearing of forests for agriculture has also increased the
severity of floods.
In India, Uttar Pradesh is considered to be amongst the worst
flood hit states of the country.
It has nearly 20% of the total 40 million hectares of flood
prone zone of the country.

 Flood plains, the low lying areas which get inundated during
floods help to reduce floods.
Building up of flood control structures like flood walls or
deepening of river channels have only transferred the problems
downstream.
Building walls prevents spilling out the flood water over flood
plains (area of land adjacent to a stream or river that stretches
from the banks of its channel to the base of the enclosing
valley walls and experiences flooding during periods of high
discharge) , but it increases the velocity of water to affect the
areas downstream with greater force.

 To check the floods, efforts need to be made to restore

wetlands, replace ground cover on water-courses, build checkdams on small streams, move buildings off the flood plains
etc.
Instead of raising buildings on flood plains, it is suggested
that floodplains should be used for wildlife habitat, parks,
recreational areas and other uses, which are not susceptible to
flood damage.
River-networking in the country is also being proposed to deal
with the flood problem.

Landslides
Landslide occurs when coherent rock of soil masses move
down slope due to gravitational pull.
Slow landslips dont cause much worry but sudden rockslides
and mudslides are dangerous.
Water and vegetation influence landslides.
Chemical action of water gradually cause chemical weathering
of rocks making them prone to landslides.
Vegetation consolidates the slope material, provides cohesion
by its root system and also retards the flow of water and its
erosion capacity.

Landslides are governed by the forces which tend to pull the

earth material down slope (move in case of slopes with
steeper slip plane) and resisting forces which tend to resist
such movements.

It is difficult to control landslides. However, these can be

minimized by stabilizing the slope by:
(i) Draining the surface and subsurface water.
(ii) Covering the landslide with an impermeable membrane,
(iii) Draining ground water away from the landslide, and
(iv) Minimizing surface irrigation.

Cyclones
Cyclones are recurring phenomena in the tropical coastal
regions.
Tropical cyclones in the warm oceans are formed because of
heat and moisture.
One of the requirements for formation of tropical cyclones is
that the sea surface temperature (SST) should be above 26C.
Tropical cyclones move like a spinning top at the speed of 1030 Km per hour.
They can last for a week or so and have a diameter varying
between 100 to 1500 Km.

 Since in the western parts of the main ocean no cold currents

exist, tropical cyclones originate there.
Tropical cyclones are called hurricanes in the Atlantic,
Caribbean and north eastern Pacific, typhoons in the western
Pacific; and cyclones in the Indian Ocean and willy willies
in the sea around Australia.

Management:
It is difficult to stop the recurrence of cyclones.
Some long term defence measures can help to protect us from
devastation.
Such measures include, planting more trees on the coastal belt,
construction of dams, dykes, embankments, storm shelter,
wind breaks, proper drainage and wide roads for quick
evacuation.

Phases of disaster management

Pre-disaster phase: taken prior to the occurrence of any disasters.

For. eg. Construction of buildings which can withstand the impact of
disaster. It is also called mitigation phase.
Actual disaster phase: During this phase, timely warning is to be
given to the people so that they can timely take action to face the
disaster. It is also called the preparatory phase.
Post-disaster phase: It includes the measures that are taken after the
occurrence of a disaster. It further includes three phases:
Relief phase: immediately after the occurrence of a disaster.
Rehabilitation phase: to rehabilitate the community through the
development of house, restoring water supply, sanitation, food
and providing loans so that the people are brought back to the
normal work.
Reconstruction Phase: It involves developing new colonies to
make the disaster affected people to settle permanently.

DISASTER MANAGEMENT CYCLE

PRE-DISASTER

DURING DISASTER

Elements of Disaster Risk Management

framework

Pre Disaster phase

During disaster

Risk assessment Diagnostic process to identify the risks that a community faces
Prevention - Activities to avoid the adverse impact of hazards
Mitigation Structural/non-structural measures undertaken to limit the adverse impact
Preparedness - Activities and measures taken in advance to ensure effective response
Early warning - Provision of timely and effective information to avoid or reduce risk

Evacuation - temporary mass departure of people and property from threatened locations
Saving people and livelihoods Protection of people and livelihoods during emergency
Immediate assistance Provision of assistance during or immediately after disaster
Assessing damage and loss Information about impact on assets and loss to production

Post disaster

Ongoing assistance Continued assistance until a certain level of recovery

Recovery - Actions taken after a disaster with a view to restoring infrastructure and services
Reconstruction - Actions taken after a disaster to ensure resettlement/relocation
Ongoing development activities Continued actions of development programmes

"Five-R Strategy"
Disaster management is based on "Five-R Strategy" of

Rescue
Relief
Restoration
Rehabilitation
Reconstruction