list of early warning equipment to be distributed among communities
A question from Ghulam Rasool, Pakistan: I need the list of early warning equipment to be distributed among communities. The early warning focus is flood, livelihood. The literacy rate of community is at lowest level.
3 Answers
Dear Ghulam
Thanks for your question --just a few points for clarification:
Is the list for members of local communities to request the equipment from outside the area when an early warning notice is issued?
Is it intended that the equipment would be stored centrally in the area prone to natural emergencies for distribution when an early warning is issued or stored in, for example, in peoples's homes all the time?
Would the list include instructions for the use of the equipment?
Any other points?
Please post your response as an answer to your original question.
Kind regards, Leigh
LC Jones
RedR KnowledgePoint Moderator
Dear Gulam, I will try to respond to your query
I assume the hazard is Flood
equipment and materials in the community: hand siren, hand mic, ropes, torches, whistles, life jacket, boat, blue/ yellow/ red colour flags/ enamels, ring-tubes. may be you can also provide some tools like pick, shawel, etc.
you need to provide cell phone numbers of district police, chief district officer, river gauge reader to key people like chair of local/ village/ community disaster management committee, coordinators of task forces (ews tf, rescue/relief tf, etc.)
Gehendra
Dear Ghulam,
While several other answers exhaustively cover equipment to assist with preparedness in the eventuality of flooding within a rural/less developed community, we thought we would compile advice from various sources that provide further context for suitable early warning systems and best practice worldwide.
[National Geographic general advice]
To begin, the National Geographic website recommends the following:
Avoid building in a floodplain
Move to higher ground in an emergency
Sandbags can be used to provide temporary floodwalls in an emergency
Devise an emergency plan which is communicated to all members of the community
Emergency kits in the event of an evacuation
o Cell phone batteries and reusable batteries for torches
[Source: Environmental Science & Policy | Lessons from flood early warning systems | 2016, Elsevier Ltd.]
Progress is certainly being made in the development and implementation of Early Warning Systems (EWS) – this is mostly down to major technological advances and improved communication technology, which has led to better forecasting techniques and sharing of flood–related information.
However, the potential benefits of such advancements in EWS will not materialise if they do not result in emergency response action. In fact, a simple EWS may be as effective as a sophisticated one if action is taken in response to a warning. It is important to match the EWS and equipment with the response capacity of the at-risk population and set up certain institutional and social conditions to ensure action is taken.
‘Engaging local communities and authorities in the EWS design can improve the effectiveness of the whole process… local knowledge can complement scientific knowledge and measurements when data is insufficient… it can validate the forecasting models e.g. through field observations.’
In addition to this, the advice given to communities is to constantly record and collate any weather-related data. This can help develop models to help with forecasting in the future.
[Delivering Early Warning Systems for the Poorest – from flood-vulnerable to flood-resilient communities | Practical Action UK 2016]
After the devastation from flooding and landslides in Nepal between 1992-2002, Practical Action started working with flood-vulnerable communities. One piece of advice they gave is to set up a watch tower and siren. This gives communities more lead-time to gather legal documents to access post-flood relief and reach higher ground.
Early Warning Equipment (rainfall monitoring):
For floods caused by heavy rainfall and/or poor drainage, some government stations are limited and do not record accurate data for all communities. In these instances, it is beneficial to elect and train local leaders to read community rain gauges and report to the respective National Water Agency to find patterns and release warnings.
The leaders will require maps to aid recording and identify the relationship between waterflow patterns and households, especially vulnerable ones. Maps will also help when developing evacuation plans.
Alongside an evacuation route, it is also important to implement an action plan strategy that includes necessary resilience-building activities. This could include skills training programmes and evacuation drills.
[The effectiveness of early warning systems for the reduction ...
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