Qualitative Risk Assessment of Critical Facilities and Hotels for Potential Storm Surge Scenarios in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh Using Surge Decay Modeling and Risk Matrix
Abstract
Bangladesh has been repeatedly ravaged by a wide variety of disasters, cyclones and associated storm surges being the most devastating due to the geographic location and morphological configuration of the area. Cox's Bazar, a coastal town in SE Bangladesh, is the most popular tourist destination of the country, attracting over half a million tourists annually. Yet no detailed study has been carried out to assess the risks related to storm surge in the area.
The study focuses on hazard scenario generation, identifying and assessing risks related to storm surge for the critical facilities and hotels as well as developing a framework for categorization of the hotels. The hazard scenarios were determined from the surge decay model using data collected from secondary sources like government organizations, reports and scientific articles. Factors controlling the risk for different facilities vary greatly and were identified and weighed by experts and users through KII and questionnaire survey. Four hazard scenarios were developed with surge heights with a return period (RP) of 10, 20, 50 and 100 years respectively. Risk Matrices were developed for each of the critical facilities as well as the hotels. The risk of damage is low to moderate by storm surges with 10 and 20 year RPs, but it is significantly higher in case of surges with 50 and 100 year RPs and ranges from high to extremely high. Although there have been appreciable efforts by the government in developing early warning system and volunteers, the study finds lack of structural integrity, poor location, poor planning along with some other challenges put a number of critical facilities at risk and hinder their pre- and post-disaster functionality. The study suggests that 90% of the hotels lack a proper preparedness, response and recovery planning. The study discerns a certain category of hotels that are at more risk than others. The study identifies the critical facilities, hotels and specific categories that are at high risk and require urgent attention. The study is easily reproducible across different study areas and will create pathways towards advanced planning of specific sector based risk reduction measures for effective cyclone disaster management.- Publication:
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AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2018
- Bibcode:
- 2018AGUFMGC53D0987H
- Keywords:
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- 0466 Modeling;
- BIOGEOSCIENCESDE: 1622 Earth system modeling;
- GLOBAL CHANGEDE: 1641 Sea level change;
- GLOBAL CHANGEDE: 4321 Climate impact;
- NATURAL HAZARDS