About
Earthquakes impact heavily on the economic development and social welfare of developing countries not only due to damages and fatalities, but also due to economic disruption and to damage to industrial facilities and critical infrastructure. Catastrophic damages to industrial facilities during the 1999 Kocaeli earthquake caused extensive fires and environmental pollution, with economic losses exceeding £30B (~10% of Turkey’s GDP).
The probability of an earthquake with magnitude ≥7.0 affecting Istanbul is estimated at around 40% in the next 30 years. Worldwide, around 1B people are exposed to similar risk, estimated at £50B/year, with developing countries being worst affected.
Damage to industrial facilities, casualties and economic losses can be rapidly and accurately predicted and managed before and immediately after a destructive event by adopting appropriate risk assessment strategies. The proposed workshop will bring together researchers, policy makers, practitioners, engineers and insurers to a) share their expertise in the field of earthquake risk assessment and management, b) develop ideas in creating novel innovative rapid risk assessment procedures, design methods, rehabilitation strategies and technologies, and c) discuss innovation challenges, funding opportunities and future directions in this field.
The International Workshop on Seismic Loss, Rehabilitation and Post-earthquake Crisis Management of Critical Infrastructure workshop builds on complementary expertise of two world-leading institutions (University of Sheffield and Istanbul Technical University) in the field of Earthquake Engineering which for over 20 years have been actively involved in collecting seismic data, testing structures, developing frameworks for Vulnerability Assessment, Rapid Seismic Risk Assessment and Management, and a System Approach for Industrial Facilities. These are critical for the updating of the Turkish National Earthquake Strategy and Action Plan.
Through this workshop, participants will share data/experience on earthquake risk assessment, train early career researchers, attract funding and help develop worldwide research.