Better Preparedness for Future Mega-disasters

Better Preparedness for Future Mega-disasters

(Abstract) The 9.0-scale earthquake that hit Japan on March 11, 2011 at 2:45 PM (local time) was the biggest quake in Japan's history and the 4th biggest recorded across the globe since modern record-keeping began in 1900. This earthquake and tsunami named as "the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake" was the most powerful known earthquake to have hit Japan. After the quake, massive tsunami waves were unleashed, crashing into Japan’s northeastern coast of Honshu, resulting in widespread damage and destruction. The earthquake and tsunami caused extensive and severe structural damage in Japan, including heavy damage to roads and railways as well as fires in many areas, and a dam collapse. Moreover, three nuclear reactors in Fukushima suffered explosions due to hydrogen gas that had built up within their outer containment buildings after a cooling system failure. Through this sequence of mega disasters we may learn how to prepare and handle this kind of multi-mega disaster. In this study 14 points to be considered for the future have been discussed. This paper has two main parts. The first part briefly reviews the environmental, humanitarian and social impacts of mega-disasters. Next, the potential issues to manage such a mega- disaster have been reviewed for better preparedness in the future.