Creating resilient communities with medium-range hazard warning systems

Abstract

Resilience to natural hazards requires integrated risk management – from hazard identification and risk register, hazard warnings and risk communication, to preparation for and response when an event occurs. Medium-range hazard warnings play a vital role in strategic and tactical planning for resilience to natural hazards. Research advancements have rapidly improved observation, modelling and analysis of natural hazard forecasting for disaster risk reduction. However, many of these advances have not been tailored to benefit communities at risk as geophysical and hydrometeorological hazards continue to claim thousands of lives and cause irreparable damage to homes, businesses and critical infrastructure. This paper discusses the opportunities to use medium-range ensemble forecasting to support decision making to increase the resilience of communities and the ways to embed holistic early warning systems in risk-informed sustainable development. It provides a set of recommendations for medium range forecasting applications for people-centred early warnings and disaster preparedness.

Keywords

• Medium-range hazard warning systems
• Ensemble forecasting
• Subseasonal-to-seasonal numerical weather prediction
• Risk register
• Risk communication
• People-centred warning