Geocoding African Disasters

Jesse Brinkman

Mentor: Pam Cowher

Project Overview

Data Prep Gather Data Organize Data Geocode the Data

Analysis What effect do El Nino/La Nina years have on

droughts in Africa? What role do development indicators play in the

severity of disasters?

What is Geocoding?

Geocoding is a way to give something a reference point on a map. Address Latitude/Longitude Other grid systems

Pacific Disaster Center 1305 N Holopono St # 2Kihei, HI 96753

Gather the Data Obtain the data from the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of

Disasters’ (CRED) Emergency Events Database (EMDAT)

Organize the Data

Using the locations provided by EMDAT assign latitude and longitude information to each disaster.

Re-format the data to be easily inserted into the GIS software.

Geocode the Data

Observations/Trends 1,580 Disasters recorded from 1981-2007 Epidemics and Floods account for 71%

585 and 532 respectively

37.03%

33.67%9.56%

8.92%

3.73%

2.53%

1.39%1.27%

0.76%0.63%0.32%0.19%

Epidemic

Flood

Drought

Wind Storm

Insect Infestation

Earthquake

Slides

Wild Fire

Volcano

Extreme Temperature

Wave/Surge

Complex

Observations/Trends cont.

Increase in disasters in recent years

Total Disasters by Year

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

140

1980

1981

1982

1983

1984

1985

1986

1987

1988

1989

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

# of disasters

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

1980

1981

1982

1983

1984

1985

1986

1987

1988

1989

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

Flood Epidemic

Floods and Epidemics by Year

Disaster Density 1981 - 1990

Disaster Density 1991 - 2000

Total Deaths by Year 1988 - 2007

0

2,000

4,000

6,000

8,000

10,000

12,000

14,000

16,000

18,000

1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007

# of Deaths

Analysis

What effects do El Nino/La Nina years have on droughts in Africa?

What role do development indicators play in the loss of life associated with disasters?

El Nino/La Nina

Hypothesis: There are more droughts during El Nino years, and less during La Nina years.

Methods: Gather the list of years that El Nino/La Nina

occurred. Look for an increase in drought occurrence.

Inse

ct I

nfes

tatio

n

Com

plex

Dis

aste

r

Wild

Fire

Ext

rem

e T

empe

ratu

re

Wav

e/S

urge

Slid

es

Vol

cano

Win

d S

torm

Ear

thqu

ake

Flo

od

Epi

dem

ic

Dro

ught

0

100,000

200,000

300,000

400,000

500,000

600,000

InsectInfestation

Wild Fire Wave/Surge Volcano Earthquake Epidemic

# of Deaths by Disaster

# of Deaths

Conclusions

No apparent correlation between # of droughts and El Nino/La Nina years

Sensitivity to Disasters

Hypothesis: Indicators such as infant mortality, literacy, and government corruption contribute to the amount of deaths per disaster.

Methods: Take the average infant mortality, literacy,

corruption perception, water stress, digital access, and human development rates.

Compare with average death/disaster

Conclusions There is no strong correlation between the two.

Sensitivity Rate vs Avg Death

R2 = 0.2153

0

50

100

150

200

250

0.00 0.10 0.20 0.30 0.40 0.50 0.60 0.70 0.80 0.90 1.00

Sensitivity Rate

Ave

rag

e K

ille

d

Future Work Possibilities

Do specific regional analysis on the El Nino/La Nina years, as opposed to Africa as a whole.

Improve the sensitivity analysis/map Better Scale Disaster by type

Individual factors which may affect particular disaster types.

Explain the increase in disasters.

Acknowledgements Pam Cowher Colin Lindeman Rich Nezelek Centre for Research on the

Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED)

Emergency Events Database (EMDAT)

The Akamai Internship Program is funded by the Center for Adaptive optics through it’s National Science Foundation Science and Technology Center grant (#AST-987683) and by grants to the Akamai Workforce Initiative from the National Science Foundation and Air Force Office of Scientific Research (both administered by NSF, #AST-0710699) and from the University of Hawaii

Lani LeBron Lisa Hunter Lynne Raschke Scott Seagroves