Emergency and Disaster Management Commons^™

Emergency Action Plan Adoption Across Athletic Training Practice Settings, Samantha E. Scarneo-Miller, Rebecca L. Stearns, Christianne M. Eason, Alicia M. Pike Lacy, Rebecca M. Lopez, Zachary K. Winkelmann, Rebecca M. Hirschhorn, Susan W. Yeargin

Rehabilitation Sciences Faculty Publications

Context:

The 2024 NATA Position Statement provides updated recommendations for EAP adoption. Past research on the 2002 statement showed limited adoption by ATs. Assessing current adoption across practice settings offers a clearer picture of the EAP implementation landscape.

Objectives:

To examine ATs' adoption of new EAP best-practice recommendations across practice settings.

Design:

Cross-Sectional study.

Setting:

Online questionnaire.

Patients or Other Participants:

Clinically active ATs (n=614) working in any practice setting (Youth, Secondary School, Division 1 Power 4, Collegiate athletics – Not Power 4, Non-Major Professional Sports, Professional Sports, Non-Sideline).

Main Outcome Measures:

Prevalence of an EAP, adoption of recommendations, and …

Aviation Guilt: The Role Of Human Factors In Airline Incidents, Alexander Silva

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Human factors play a central role in aviation safety, influencing entire processes in an aviation environment. This paper reviews human factors in aviation as a whole to create a picture of what causes many aviation accidents. Models such as the SHEL model, Swiss Cheese Model, and Wickens MRT will be introduced to illuminate both the ways in which a flight deck should operate and why certain decisions are made in critical situations. Some of the deadliest aviation accidents have resulted from human error, such as the Tenerife airport disaster and AF447. These disasters were seminal in the development and execution …

Cost-Effective Strategies For Feral Swine Control: Exploring Trapping Equipment Cooperatives, Phil Kenkel, Riza Radmehr, Rodney Holcomb, Mckenzie Boyce

Human–Wildlife Interactions

Feral swine (Sus scrofa) in the United States have become a growing concern, with a population of ≥6 million and causing annual damages of ≥$1.5 billion USD. Because of their high reproductive capacity, effective control methods are crucial to reducing or slowing their population growth. While remotely monitored and triggered traps have proven to be an effective control strategy, the cost of sophisticated trapping equipment, which can cost ≥$7,000 USD, is often cost prohibitive for many landowners. Despite the pressing need to address the challenge of making effective feral swine control methods more affordable, there are few studies …

Factors Contributing To Fatalities In Helicopter Emergency Medical Service Accidents, Jenna Korentsides, Joseph R. Keebler, Mihhail Berezovski, Alex Chaparro

Publications

INTRODUCTION: T his study aimed to update and reinforce previous research on helicopter emergency medical service accidents in the United States. By investigating predictors of fatalities after helicopter emergency medical service crashes through the application of machine learning techniques, we updated existing data sets and sought to uncover patterns that traditional analysis might not reveal.

METHODS: Using the National Transportation Safety Board database, the authors analyzed a dataset of 267 helicopter emergency medical service accidents between 1991–2022. We first calculated fatalities odds ratios for each condition. We then plotted geospatial locations of all reported accidents. Finally, we used XGBoost regression …

Socio-Economic And Infrastructural Determinants Of Response Time Disparities Across Emergency Service Agencies, Alice N. Ottah

Electronic Theses & Dissertations (2024 - present)

This study comprehensively analyzes the determinants of disparities in emergency response times for EMS, Fire, and Police agencies in San Francisco from 2021 to 2023, utilizing a multilevel modeling framework and publicly accessible data. Contrary to a primary reliance on structural neighborhood factors, this research reveals that while neighborhood disadvantage statistically significantly interacts with agency type to influence response times, its direct effect is weak and not uniformly consistent across services. Specifically, the analysis demonstrates that variance in call response times across neighborhoods is minimal (Intraclass Correlation Coefficients < 0.02), the effects of disadvantage are agency-specific (null effects for Police and Fire), and even when significant (for EMS calls only), response times are faster in more disadvantaged neighborhoods. These findings challenge the existing literature on emergency response times and highlight the need for tailored policy interventions that consider both neighborhood context and agency-specific operations to promote equitable emergency response.

Empirical Vulnerability Function Development Based On The Damage Caused By The 2014 Chiang Rai Earthquake, Thailand, Patcharavadee Hong, Masashi Matsuoka

Institute for Innovation & Entrepreneurship Publications

Seismic hazards in Thailand are frequently overlooked in disaster management planning, leading to insufficient research and significant economic losses during earthquake events. The 2014 Chiang Rai earthquake exposed critical vulnerabilities in Thailand's building practices due to widespread non-compliance with building codes and limited preparedness. This exposure prompted the development of empirical vulnerability functions using loss data from 15,031 damaged residences. The study analyzed government compensation records, which were standardized using replacement cost metrics. Three distinct models were developed through probabilistic and possibilistic modeling approaches. Residual analysis demonstrated the superior performance of the possibilistic approach, with the Possibilistic-based Vulnerability Function achieving …

Improving Understanding And Connections For Preparedness, Mitigation, Response, And Recovery For Tornado And Straight-Line Wind Events In Virginia: Summary Of The Inaugural Virginia Tornado And Straight-Line Wind Summit, Wie Yusuf, Monica Arul, Joshua Behr, Kaleen Lawsure, An Huy Pham, Henry Attivor

School of Public Service Faculty Publications

Background

The Virginia Tornado and Straight-Line Wind Summit, the first of its kind in the Commonwealth, was held on October 15, 2025 in Isle of Wight County, Virginia. The Summit had several goals, including:

• Understanding Virginia’s wind risk and learning the science behind it.
• Hearing lessons learned from emergency managers who have experienced extreme wind events.
• Learning about practical steps to prepare, mitigate, and respond to severe wind events.
• Learning best practices for timely and actionable communication with the public before and after events.
• Strengthening interagency coordination and connecting with others to share resources, align priorities, and coordinate resilience planning. …

Family Stress Processes Underlying Covid-19-Related Economic Insecurity For Mothers And Fathers And Children's Internalizing Behavior Problems, Joyce Y. Lee, Shawna J. Lee, Sehun Oh, Amy Xu, Angelise Radney, Christina M. Rodriguez

Psychology Faculty Publications

COVID‐19 and its economic fallout have resulted in unprecedented financial insecurity and material hardship for many American families, with a disproportionately negative impact on children and families from socioeconomically disadvantaged contexts. The current study applied the family stress model to examine the family processes underlying pandemic‐related economic insecurity and children's internalizing behaviours. Online survey data from an economically diverse sample of mothers and fathers, who experienced at least one type of pandemic‐related economic insecurity in the United States (N = 259), were collected across two longitudinal time points in the early weeks of COVID‐19: (1) 14 April and (2) 30 …

Social Susceptibility-Driven Longitudinal Tornado Reconnaissance Methodology: 2021 Midwest Quad-State Tornado Outbreak, John W. Van De Lindt, Wanting "Lisa" Wang, Blythe Johnston, P. Shane Crawford, Guirong Yan, Thang Dao, Trung Do, Katie Skakel, Mojtaba Harati, Tu Nguyen, Robinson Umeike, Silvana Croope

Civil & Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

With the impact of climate change, the intensity and frequency of tornado events have been increasing. Enhancing tornado reconnaissance methods can comprehensively capture building damage and recovery data following tornado events and outbreaks, thereby strengthening community resilience against the threat of future tornado events. Advancements in tornado data reconnaissance research have embraced remote sensing techniques to assess building damage after tornado events, supplanting traditional reconnaissance methods relying on handheld cameras with GIS mapping. Community resilience research offers a groundbreaking perspective, stressing the importance of assessing buildings throughout their recovery cycle-from damage and functionality to recovery-and considering their socioeconomic stability in …

Multi-Centennial Spatial Coherency Among Atlantic Tropical Cyclones From Simulated And Reconstructed Storm Records, Richard M. Sullivan, Elizabeth Wallace, Sylvia Dee, Gabiel A. Vecchi, Wenchang Yang, Kerry Emanuel

OES Faculty Publications

Proxy-based reconstructions of long-term Atlantic tropical cyclone (TC) variability reveal low-frequency oscillations in regional TC landfalls over the Common Era. However, the limited spatial coverage and increased uncertainty of the proxy records complicates assessments of this feature. Here we present a new multi-ensemble set of synthetic TCs downscaled from the Last Millennium Reanalysis project, which is based on sea surface temperatures that more accurately reflect past conditions. Throughout ensemble members, there are coherent multi-centennial shifts in landfalls with persistent intervals of increased (decreased) occurrence along the eastern US concurrent with inverse activity in the southwest Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico, …

Yucatan Hurricane Activity Highlights Common Era Tropical Cyclone Dipole, Richard M. Sullivan, Peter J. Van Hengstum, Elizabeth J. Wallace, Sloan Coats, Jeffrey P. Donnelly, Robert Korty, Shawna N. Little, Martin G. Maas Vargas, Luis Mejia-Ortiz, Eduard G. Reinhardt, Courtney Schumacher, Anne E. Tamalavage, Tyler S. Winkler

OES Faculty Publications

Tropical cyclone (TC) impacts along the western Atlantic and Caribbean margin are not spatially uniform. Proxy based reconstructions of Common Era TC activity highlight this non-uniform distribution at centennial-millennial timescales. However, the sparse geographic scope of these reconstructions impedes our assessment of TC landfalls across broader spatial domains. This work presents a compilation of new and existing TC reconstructions from the Yucatan Peninsula for comparison with a contemporaneous compilation from New England, showing that these regions occupy distal nodes of a low-frequency TC dipole. Increased Yucatan (New England) storminess is closely linked to intervals of Northern Hemisphere warming (cooling) and …

Analyzing The Centers For Disease Control And Prevention Mortality Data Using Weekly Exceedance In Mortality Count And Weekly Change In Mortality Indicator: A Time Series Study, Aditya Chakraborty, Mohan D. Pant

Epidemiology, Biostatistics, & Environmental Health Faculty Publications

Background and Aims

Cause-specific mortality (CSM) count prediction plays a vital role in the context of public health policy. In this study, we introduce a new analytical approach, which is divided into three phases to answer specific questions regarding CSM due to 14 specific causes by computing different simple, compound, and conditional probabilities.

Methods

A multivariate time series forecasting model was developed using the CDC weekly mortality count data. A binary data matrix was constructed for 14 causes of death (COD) as a function of weeks by combining the observed and forecasted mortalities. We introduced two new concepts: Weekly Exceedance …

Uncertainty-Aware Deep Learning Framework For Forecasting Coastal Water Level In Virginia Beach, Md Mahmudul Hasan, Malachi Schram, Sridhar Katragadda, Diana Mcspadden, Alisa N. Udomvisawakul, Heather Richter, Frank Liu

Computer Science Faculty Publications

Coastal areas like Virginia Beach, USA, are increasingly vulnerable to flooding. To mitigate the impact of flooding, it is crucial for the City of Virginia Beach to have reliable 72-hour-ahead (3 days) forecasts of water levels at key gauge locations. To support this effort, several sensors have been installed throughout the city to monitor water levels and other environmental parameters such as wind speed, precipitation, and atmospheric pressure. Leveraging sensor data from one of these locations, we developed an uncertainty-aware deep learning model to forecast water levels. We employed deep quantile regression (DQR) to quantify variability in the predictions and …

Analyzing Visual Attention In Virtual Crime Scene Investigations Using Eye-Tracking And Vr: Insights For Cognitive Modeling, Wen-Chao Yang, Chih-Hung Shih, Jiajun Jiang, Sergio Pallas Enguita, Chung-Hao Chen

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Understanding human perceptual strategies in high-stakes environments, such as crime scene investigations, is essential for developing cognitive models that reflect expert decision-making. This study presents an immersive experimental framework that utilizes virtual reality (VR) and eye-tracking technologies to capture and analyze visual attention during simulated forensic tasks. A 360° panoramic crime scene, constructed using the Nikon KeyMission 360 camera, was integrated into a VR system with HTC Vive and Tobii Pro eye-tracking components. A total of 46 undergraduate students aged 19 to 24–23, from the National University of Singapore in Singapore and 23 from the Central Police University in Taiwan—participated …

The Towering Inferno: Art, Policy, And Legacy, Charles R. Jennings

Publications and Research

The Christian Regenhard Center for Emergency Response Studies, leveraging the expertise of its faculty, staff, Advisory Board and colleagues, has consistently programmed activities focused on high-rise fire safety. The upcoming 50^th anniversary of the film The Towering Inferno was an inspiration.

We decided this would be more lighthearted and less purely technical than many of our events. We wanted to consider both the film, and use it to reflect on the state of fire safety in tall buildings in New York City.

Of course it does not escape us that the topic of fire safety is a serious one, …

An Integrated Machine Learning Approach For Identifying Emergency Rescue Messages On Social Media During Natural Disasters, Wael Khallouli, Jiang Li, Jingwei Huang, Ghaith Rabadi, Samuel Kovacic

School of Cybersecurity Faculty Publications

During large-scale disasters, emergency call centers are often overwhelmed by the large volume of rescue requests and calls for help. Consequently, people are turning to social media platforms to seek assistance. Rescue information posted on these platforms is extremely valuable for first responders to make informed rescue decisions. Therefore, the automatic identification of these requests from the vast amount of data posted on social media during crises is critical yet challenging. This work presents our ongoing research on applying deep learning techniques to extract actionable rescue information from social media during crises. We proposed a novel deep learning model that …

From Cyclones To Cybersecurity: A Call For Convergence In Risk And Crisis Communications Research, Ann Marie Reinhold, Ross J. Gore, Barry Ezell, Clemente I. Izurieta, Elizabeth A. Shanahan

VMASC Publications

Effective risk and crisis communication can improve health and safety and reduce harmful effects of hazards and disasters. A robust body of literature investigates mechanisms for improving risk and crisis communication. While effective risk and crisis communication strategies are equally desired across different hazard types (e.g., natural hazards, cyber security), the extent to which risk and crisis communication experts utilize the “lessons learned” from scientific domains outside their own is suspect. Therefore, we hypothesized that risk and crisis communication research is siloed according to academic disciplines at the detriment to the advancement of the field of risk communications research writ …

Proactive Distributed Emergency Response With Heterogeneous Tasks Allocation, Justice Darko, Hyoshin Park

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Faculty Publications

Traditionally, traffic incident management (TIM) programs coordinate the deployment of emergency resources to immediate incident requests without accommodating the interdependencies on incident evolutions in the environment. However, ignoring these inherent interdependencies while making current deployment decisions is shortsighted, and the resulting naive deployment strategy can significantly worsen the overall incident delay impact on the network. The interdependencies on incident evolution in the environment, including those between incident occurrences and those between resource availability in near-future requests and the anticipated duration of the immediate incident request, should be considered through a look-ahead model when making current-stage deployment decisions. This study develops …

Managing The Impact Of Workplace Trauma For Australian First Responders: Harmonizing Policy And Practice, Aglae Hernandez Grande, Fleur Sharafizad, Ben Farr-Wharton, Yvonne Brunetto, Matthew Richman

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Police, fire, ambulance, and emergency services workers face an increased exposure to traumatic events while at work, negatively affecting their mental health, and with broader financial, legal, and moral implications for the public sector organizations that employ them. To better support these workers, and to mitigate the potential financial burden resulting from workers’ compensation claims, many first responder organizations are implementing wellbeing initiatives. This article examines the efficacy of an initiative for a sample of 530 frontline and administrative first responders, working in one state jurisdiction in Australia. The results indicate that wellbeing programmes moderate the impact of trauma on …

Protect Small Businesses: Addressing Security Threats And Insider Risks, Alan Saquella

Publications

Small businesses face unique security challenges that make them highly vulnerable compared to larger organizations. While large companies often have dedicated teams of cybersecurity experts, fraud examiners, investigators and the resources to implement robust security measures, small businesses typically operate with limited budgets and minimal staff, making them prime targets for a variety of internal and external threats.

More Inland Homeowners Are Experiencing Floods, But Few Have Flood Insurance, Julian Tiburcio

Capstones

Wherever it rains, it can flood. More inland homeowners who never expected to see their homes flood are finding themselves inundated by rain as climate change intensifies extreme storms and weather patterns. Many homeowners decide to buy homes not realizing that flooding isn’t limited to coastal areas, so they forego flood insurance coverage, leaving their biggest asset at risk.

Breaking The Yoke: A Systematic Unmasking Of Challenges To Sustainable Rural Development In South Sudan, Gai Chol Paul

Journal of Sustainable Social Impact

South Sudan, a young nation grappling with the legacy of protracted conflict, faces significant challenges in fostering sustainable rural development. While the immense potential of its vast agricultural lands remains largely untapped, the persistent triple threat of insecurity, deficient infrastructure, and the absence of robust government policy actively hinders progress. The ongoing armed conflict, characterized by inter-communal violence and sporadic attacks, casts a long shadow over rural areas in South Sudan. Thus, I developed this mixed-method multiple-case study, grounded in the sustainable livelihoods framework, to explore challenges that hinder sustainable rural development in South Sudan. I collected data through document …

Impact Of Safety Training On Employee's Perceptions Of Organizational Safety Culture, Brooke Reid-Graves

Dissertations

Workplace safety and well-being are vital for all workers, regardless of their profession (Young et al., 2022). Studies show that providing employees with training focused on recognizing hazards and implementing safety practices is essential for reducing occupational risks (Namian et al., 2020; Rose & Rae, 2017). Research underscores the importance of fostering a positive organizational safety culture for risk reduction (Berry et al., 2020; Downey, 2019). Understanding the impact of safety training on shaping an organization’s safety culture is key to promoting safe working environments (Mahjoub, 2013).

This study utilized the perspectives of high school staff regarding safety training and …

Building Community Resilience Through Community Participatory Asset Mapping For Emergency Preparedness, Cassandra Y. Davila

2024 Fall Honors Capstone Projects - Archive

A community's capacity to prepare, manage, and recover from a disaster determines its level of resilience. The Federal Emergency Management Agency recommends engaging community members in resilience planning to ensure sustainable strategies are implemented. This project uses community-based asset mapping to identify how community participatory methods influence community resilience to combat emergency events. An asset map documents a community’s existing resources, highlighting its strengths. Focus group discussions in the urban area will be conducted to obtain feedback about existing assets and suggestions for additional resources to include. The expected result of this project is to build a comprehensive map of …

Challenges, Coping Strategies, And Benefits Of Animal-Assisted Crisis Response Following Disasters And Traumatic Events, Yvonne M. Eaton-Stull, Batya G. Jaffe, Kay Scott, Makenzie Shiller

People and Animals: The International Journal of Research and Practice

Animal-assisted crisis response (AACR) is an innovative intervention whereby highly trained comfort dogs offer support in the aftermath of disasters and traumatic events. This qualitative cross-sectional exploratory study investigated the experiences of specialized, experienced AACR handlers. A snowball sampling yielded 99 experienced responders who completed an anonymous electronic survey. Data was analyzed using a qualitative coding process with Atlas.ti. This study explored emotional challenges, handlers’ coping strategies, and benefits provided by the AACR comfort dog. Forty-eight percent of AACR handlers saw human-made crises as the most challenging deployments. Seventy-two percent of handlers rated their distress during a deployment a 3, …

The Liability Of Classification Societies : A Comparative Study With A Focus On Criminal Liability Under The Law Of The Republic Of Korea And Other Jurisdictions, Hyunho Kim

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Domestication Of Imo Instrument : An Assessment Of The National Legislations Of Vanuatu Implementing Imo Instruments With Reference To The Iii Code., Seiloni Akanete Toakuru

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Managing The Waste Problem From Cargo Ships In The Area Of Ko Aichang, Thailand : The Educator’S Perspective, Thanasorn Siangsai, Rtn.

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Legal Analysis Of Piracy And Armed Robbery At Sea Law In Liberia's Maritime Jurisdictions, Stephen Yekeson Kamara

World Maritime University Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Estimating The Economic Impact Of A Natural Disaster On The Workforce Resiliency: An Analysis Of The Virginia Beach - Chesapeake - Norfolk Metropolitan Statistical Area, Robert M. Mcnab, Yin-Hsuen Chen, George Mcleod

Presentations, Lectures, Posters, Reports

In this paper, we explore the potential economic impacts associated with a major hurricane making landfall in Hampton Roads. We estimate the direct damages from a Florence-like Category 3 hurricane with a 3.6 feet tidal offset are estimated at $15.6 billion, equivalent to 10% of the 2022 regional GDP. If we apply existing flood insurance rates to these projected damages, we estimate that the total economic impact would exceed $12 billion with a short-term loss of more than 76,000 jobs. The job losses are concentrated in sectors that provide services to households which would bear the brunt of damages during …