Project description

Within the new project “Forensic Disaster Analysis” (FDA), CEDIM started an interdisciplinary research initiative to analyze natural disasters and their impact in near real-time. Focus is the complex interaction between natural hazards, infrastructure and society. The aim is not only to help understanding a disaster in near real-time but also to identify the root causes of the event to derive implications for a long-term risk reduction. One important information source therefore are historical events.

Results for a specific disaster are published in a FDA-report, which is updated and extended with new information. The readership consists of mainly three groups: scientists, media and public. Since all three groups have a very heterogeneous level of knowledge, the reports might not be understandable for all in the same way.

To improve the two aspects mentioned above (a) comparison of events and (b) reader oriented presentation of results, we want to develop a new platform. It should (a) let the reader interactively search the database for historical event and (b) present FDA results more concisely and focused on the reader’s status of knowledge. Current working title is “CEDIM Event Explorer”.

In the end, a user oriented visualization of FDA results can increase the spreading of the disaster analysis and it can make a valuable contribution to the further use of the results.