In this lesson, you will learn about the differences between risk and hazard vulnerability assessments. You will learn the basic process for conducting these assessments and the information they provide to assist you in planning your response to an incident.

Upon completion of this lesson, you will be able to:

• Distinguish between risk assessment and hazard vulnerability assessment.
• Describe the information that risk and hazard vulnerability assessments can provide.
• Describe the process for conducting a hazards analysis.

Every community is different, so it is critical that you identify hazards that are most likely to affect you. By conducting risk and hazard vulnerability assessments, your community can be prepared.

Risk assessments provide information about what hazards are likely to occur in your community. Risk assessment answers the question, “What could happen to adversely impact the community?”

Hazard vulnerability assessments (HVAs) include information about how often each hazard is likely to occur, the area likely to be impacted, and how severe the impact may be. The HVA answers the question, “How and where could each hazard affect the community?”

It is quite likely that your community has already completed risk and hazard vulnerability assessments that merely need to be updated when new information is available or new hazards or vulnerabilities are identified. Be sure to coordinate your efforts with local emergency management and check your Comprehensive Emergency Management Plan (CEMP) or other community emergency plans. Much of the work may already have been completed.

Gregg Varner, Director of Solid Waste (retired), County of Charleston, SC

Knowing what your community is subject to get hit with, whether it’s hurricanes, earthquakes, whatever – you’ve got to know that kind of stuff so you can plan for it. And then once you know that, you take a look at your community, and all communities are different– everything is community-specific – when you take a look at those things, then you want to look at critical facilities. You want to especially know where things like hospitals and nursing homes are because they are a priority. They’re the kinds of places that public safety wants to get to, and those are the kind of priorities that you identify ahead of time, and then they can change based on the nature of the event.

Christine Walsh, Director of Operations, City of Beloit, WI

In order to establish priorities, we looked at our critical infrastructure and our key resources, so for example, main arterials going through the city, specific public facilities and grounds that we thought were key critical infrastructure. We looked at our traffic patterns; we also looked at environmental management – our city is divided by a river – and what happens if they have a flood. Then you need to look at, as well, your water, wastewater, utilities, transit systems – those are all critical infrastructure or key resources that every city depends on.

Each individual community, no matter how small, has to look at their critical infrastructure and the key resources that they have to be able to do the risk, vulnerability, and damage assessments.

John Chapman, Fire Chief (retired), City of Kissimmee, FL

After September 11th, every community in the United States did a hazard vulnerability assessment. It is surprising how many agencies did the assessment and then made it a secret. Our colleagues should not be operating in a vacuum; we need this information if we’re going to manage our communities safely and effectively. The vulnerability assessment is another tool for assessment, potential improvement, and overall safety.

As you’ve learned, risk assessment answers the question, “What could happen to adversely impact the community?” More specifically, risk assessment identifies and characterizes all hazards that may affect the community such as:

• Natural hazards
• Adversarial/human-caused hazards
• Cascading emergencies

Natural Disasters

Naturally occurring incidents such as earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, and flooding that have occurred in the past or are likely to occur need to be included in your community’s risk assessment.

Adversarial/Human-caused Hazards

Dangers associated with hazardous materials facilities, such as oil or gas pipelines or nuclear power plants need to be considered as part of your community’s risk assessment. Industrial facilities may store large amounts of chemicals on their property, and even a small amount of hazardous materials can be an issue.

Funding for emergency management training related to hazardous chemicals may be available to your community under the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA), Title III. Consult the list of Resources in the Toolkit for more information about SARA.

Cascading Emergencies

Following an event, one incident can trigger another. For example, an earthquake could trigger fires from ruptured gas lines or a hazardous materials release at a damaged chemical facility. This cascade of events is something that your community should consider to prevent one incident from becoming multiple.

Functional Needs Populations

Functional needs populations include individuals who may be more vulnerable because of immobility or their inability to take protective action. These individuals can include children, the elderly, migrant individuals/families, tourists, non-native English speakers, mobile home residents, and inmates. It may also include those who have disabilities, who live in institutionalized settings, who are transportation disadvantaged, or who are from diverse cultures.

Although every community is different, there are some basic steps that need to be performed to effectively assess risks and vulnerabilities for the community. These common steps are shown on the graphic collectively as the Hazard Analysis Process. The next several screens will describe each of these steps in greater detail.

The first step in the hazard analysis process is to identify all the hazards that may occur in your community, such as hurricanes, earthquakes, or hazardous material releases. Look through newspapers and other historical records to see what events have impacted your community in the past and get information about frequency, magnitude, and extent of damage. Forecasters can provide information about what types of hazard events can be expected for the year. Other possible sources of information include reviewing existing plans and reports, talking to the experts in area, and gathering information from websites.

All subsequent steps in the planning process are built on the information gathered during risk assessment, so it’s important to be thorough. As you proceed, remember to keep records of what you’ve found and where you’ve found it.

After you’ve created a list of potential hazards, the next step is to narrow down the list to the most prevalent hazards in your area and develop hazard event profiles to document the unique characteristics of each hazard type. For each hazard, use historical data, existing plans and reports, and other available information to answer questions like:

• How often is this hazard likely to occur?
• What happens as a result of this hazard (e.g., high wind, flooding, etc.)?
• Where is it likely to strike?
• How large an area is it likely to affect?
• How long can it be expected to last?
• What time of year is it more likely to occur?
• How fast is it likely to occur?
• Does a warning system exist, and how much warning time is there?
• What is the potential for cascading effects?

You will use this data to compare and prioritize the risks according to frequency, magnitude, warning time, severity, and other special considerations. Be sure to document the findings and map the hazards to show the potential areas of impact for each hazard and the effects on your planning area.

Click this link to view a worksheet for comparing and prioritizing risks.

Click this link to see a sample Hazard Profile document.

During the third step in the hazard analysis process, which is also known as developing a Community Exposure Profile, you will determine which assets in the community could be affected by the hazard and create a list of those assets. Assets include buildings and infrastructure such as critical facilities and key resources, natural resource areas, businesses, and residences.

This inventory of existing buildings (number, type, value) and estimation of potential loss following known hazards helps determine actions during damage assessment. Knowing areas of weakness helps focus resources, particularly on vulnerable populations and critical facilities, which could impact recovery. It is important to know if there are hazardous materials at that location or if there are special response needs or even if special equipment is needed to respond to an event at that location. The HVA will help determine mitigation opportunities or corrective actions that can be designed or implemented to reduce the vulnerabilities and make the community more disaster resistant. Be sure to consult the Hazard Mitigation Plan for your community. The information included in it will help in completing your HVA.

Click this link to view a sample Community Exposure Profile.

During this step, create a map of assets in your community. Then, compare this asset map to the hazard map developed in the previous step to determine which assets could be impacted by each hazard.

Specify the areas most likely to be affected (e.g., the entire town, low lying areas, downtown, rural, highways). You can use a Geographic Information Systems (GIS)-based approach such as the Hazards U.S. Multi-Hazard (HAZUS-MH) software to map your community’s assets.

An overlay can be produced by hand using a light table or through the use of GIS. As shown in the image, a map showing the location of the community’s assets can be produced by overlaying the base map for the community with a map delineating hazard area boundaries. This will help you identify which structures are located in more than one hazard zone and which areas of the community or state are more or less susceptible to different hazards.

You can learn more about HAZUS-MH and GIS by visiting the links provided on the Resources page of the Toolkit.

Consider the implications for response and recovery, based on how the following areas are expected to be impacted by the hazards:

• Populations/Demographics
• Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources
• Facilities

Be sure to document all of your findings, keep track of the inventory data, and update the inventory regularly. Click on the highlighted text to learn more about considerations for different categories of assets.

Click this link to access all of the information presented on this page in a new window.

Populations/Demographics

Including functional needs populations and locations is an important part of the community exposure profile. For each hazard, determine who could be impacted (e.g., all residents or certain neighborhoods/areas). If the hazard is likely to affect only certain areas, indicate those areas in the assessment so that resources can be allocated appropriately following a hazard.

These individuals may have additional needs before, during, and after an incident in functional areas, including maintaining independence, communication, transportation, supervision, and medical care. Knowing where these populations are located in your community is important so that additional measures can be taken as deemed necessary prior to and immediately following a hazard.

Critical Infrastructure and Key Resources

You must consider how each hazard could affect the critical facilities and infrastructure in your community. Remember, essential facilities are those that are necessary for the health and welfare of the population of your community. By including essential facilities, transportation systems, lifeline systems, high potential loss facilities, and hazardous material facilities as part of your community exposure profile, you can plan appropriate response and recovery actions to be implemented following a hazard.

Lifelines and infrastructure that should be considered include roads/streets, highways, services, potable water, and electrical systems. Keep in mind that damage to any of these systems could have severe detrimental effects to the community as a whole. For example, if a bridge is damaged, then emergency medical services, law enforcement, and firefighters may be unable to get to the people and places where they’re needed most.

Be sure to keep current information about critical facilities. Having a database of this information available will be useful when allocating resources following a hazard. You should have a list of the name and location of all critical facilities in your community. Other information kept on file should include the location of each facility (including GPS and/or National Grid System coordinates), contact information, and a note about any special response equipment that may be needed for that facility.

This assessment of critical facilities and infrastructure will help you determine priorities for allocating resources or activation of additional resources so infrastructure can be restored quickly after a hazard event. It will also help you determine potential costs for responding to and recovering from the hazard event.

Buildings

Determine what types of building (e.g., residential, commercial, and/or government) will be impacted by each hazard, and consider the implications. For example, if residential areas may be affected, the community may need more public shelters following a hazard event. Damaged commercial areas or government buildings may mean long-term economic or other impacts to the community.

Determine where volunteers and other personnel, such as those from State and Federal agencies, will set up, and identify distribution centers and staging areas. Also be sure to establish an alternate Emergency Operations Center (EOC) in case it is damaged or inaccessible during or after an event, or in case your current facility may be too small to handle a large number of people during a serious event.

The fourth step in the hazard analysis process combines the information from the previous steps to determine an estimate of expected losses from hazards. For the hazards you identified earlier that are most likely to affect your community, you should analyze losses in terms of people, buildings, building contents, critical infrastructure and key resources, and other important assets. Be sure to consider the following types of effects:

• Human needs
• Economy
• Environment
• Response Agencies

Click on the highlighted text to learn more about types of losses.

To analyze the losses, you will determine the extent of the damages and then calculate the loss from each hazard event. Be sure that you have the most current property values when you perform this estimation.

The estimation performed in this step enables you to determine which assets could potentially face the most damage and which hazard could bring about the greatest losses. This information will help determine where to focus resources following a hazard to try to lessen the impact on the community.

Click this link to access all of the information presented on this page in a new window.

Impacts on Human Needs

Consider the number of households who could be displaced, the number of individuals who may need public shelters, and the need for social services such as counseling or financial assistance.

Economic Impacts

Each hazard can have a different economic impact on a community. For example, if commercial or industrial areas are affected and businesses have to close, residents may lose their jobs. As a result, unemployment costs may rise or large numbers of your population may leave the community in search of work. As another example, if tourist attractions are damaged, the community could lose needed revenue from sales taxes paid by tourists, and businesses may be forced to close.

Planning for the economic effects of each hazard will help your community know when additional resources may need to be requested from the State or Federal level. It will also help your community plan for the economic recovery, which can be a long process depending on the severity of the hazard.

Environmental Impacts

When considering how each hazard could impact the community, remember to think about both short- and long-term effects to the environment. For example, if the sewer treatment plant is damaged, there could be major lasting effects to the environment and the area’s population if the sewer treatment plant begins pumping out untreated sewage directly into the waterways.

An environmental impact that is almost always a consideration after a hazard event is debris removal and management. Consider the amount of debris (in tons) that may need to be removed and whether additional resources will be needed to deal with environmental impacts.

Impacts to the Capabilities of Response Agencies

As a part of the Community Exposure Profile, list each agency and its anticipated roles and responsibilities. These agencies may include Public Works, Fire, EMS, Law Enforcement, Department of Environmental Protection, Mutual Aid, private agencies, and commercial enterprises. Determine what agencies and what additional resources are needed to respond to minimize the impact of each hazard identified during the risk assessment. Also consider how each hazard could affect the various agencies’ ability to respond to and recover from the event.

Identify measures you can take to protect the capabilities and resources of these agencies. For example, be sure to move utility trucks, ambulances, fire trucks, and other emergency response vehicles out of harm’s way (such as out of the flood zone) so they are not disabled by the hazard.

The FEMA publication 386-2, Understanding Your Risks: Identifying Hazards and Estimating Losses, provides guidance and worksheets for calculating losses. You can use HAZUS-MH to estimate vulnerability of each structure and determine estimated impacts of an incident. Professional engineers have a number of processes, books, and resources that they use to estimate damage. Damage estimates should be based on specific types of construction. For example, if a warehouse is damaged, they can look at information specific to warehouses, and the estimation differs from damage to another type of structure such as an office building.

You can learn more about HAZUS-MH and GIS by visiting the links provided on the Resources page of the Toolkit.

The estimation performed in this step enables you to determine which assets could potentially face the most damage and which hazard could bring about the greatest losses. This information will help you determine where to focus resources following a hazard to try to lessen the impact on your community.

Click this link to view a sample loss estimation form (review.c2ti.com/FEMA LCMS/IS0559/lesson2/assets/01_02_140.pdf)

After you’ve completed the four steps in the hazard analysis process, you are not “finished” with hazard analysis. You must ensure that members of the damage assessment response team and others involved in emergency management understand the community's risks and vulnerabilities. To this end, a scenario should be developed for each hazard that can be used to develop exercises for practicing response actions for actual events. You will learn more about exercises later in this course.

The HVA also requires maintenance. You should periodically revisit it to determine if it is still accurate. Ask yourself questions like:

• Do all of the hazards still pose a threat?
• Are there hazards not included that pose a potential threat?
• Does the risk assessment specifically consider the possibility and impact of cascading hazards?
• Are any profiles or other information missing from the risk assessment?
• Has the relative threat of any hazards changed since the assessment was done?
• Has new infrastructure been put into place?
• Have priorities changed?