Comparative Analysis Of Natural Disasters In USA And South Africa

Discussion

Write about the Comparative Analysis Scenario of Two Natural Calamities.

The concept of natural disaster is an event caused by natural causes like huge rain fall or volcanic eruption that lead to great loss of life (Study.com, 2018).Sudden occurrence of such disastrous natural event creates a dreadful impact on livelihood of local victims intensely. Two natural disasters which took place in USA and South Africa that left their traces on humankind as well as on nature are to be described in this brief analysis.  It will elaborate thorough comparison of affected areas, number of casualties, measures taken by government and possible factors to avoid such calamities regarding these two countries.This study on natural calamities will display the affected areas of USA by Hurricane Sandy and the affected areas in South Africa by a devastating flood in 2011. This study will also provide reasons behind disasters and measures which government has adapted for the avoidance along with a comparative analysis of the mentioned natural calamities. 

The hurricane Sandy, also known as “Superstorm Sandy” hit Northeast United States, Canada,and Caribbean Islands in October 2012 claiming more than 147 lives (CNN, 2018). The report says that the number of casualties includes 48 from New York, 12 from New Jersey, 5 from Connecticut and two from Pennsylvania. According to Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), approximately 246 million US dollars of government revenue was lost along with 4.75 billion US dollars of infrastructure damage (Hughes, et al., 2014). Five Caribbean nations named Bahamas, Cuba, Haiti, Puerto Rica and Jamaica have been affected majorly by this superstore. This superstore was also damaged more than 200,000 homes in USA which affected to more than 800,000 US citizen. On the other hand, in South Africa, more than 500 people lost their lives and over 6000 people lost their habitats due to heavy flood in the year 2011 (Answers Africa, 2018). Botswana was the most affected area in this flood. More than 630 schools and 42 health units got closed due to this disastrous flood.Owing to this issue, the government of South Africa had to rescue almost 20,000 people from the affected areas. Other than South Africa this thunderstorm and flood issue affected other African nations like Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana,andZambia.

According to David Robinson, New Jersey’s State Climatologist, the Hurricane Sandy was mainly caused due to trough of low pressure going on in the atmosphere fed by Arctic air which was further backed up by the higher tides because of a Black moon (Live Science, 2018).Another cause of the hurricane was that a huge storm took shape beforehand having heavy wind speeding up to nearly 90 miles per hour and made landfall on the East Coast being fed by Hurricane Grace.This superstorm was generated from tropical storm of Caribbean Sea. Initially, this storm developed into the hurricane of category 1. When this hurricane had a landfall in Jamaica, it had a speed of 80 mph and when this landfalls in Cuba at that time it increased to 105 mph by changed into the category 2 hurricane.

Causes behind the disasters in USA and South Africa

Hughes, et al., (2014) argues that the cause of deadly flood in South Africa was heavy and continuous rainfall that went on for several weeks. It was also reported that the flood was the direct result of the changing weather pattern from 2010 to 2011.Also, the World Bank had declared to lend money to the government of South Africa for the aid of the 60000 homeless people and the families that had suffered from the loss of their family members. One of the major reason behind the flood in South Africa was the overflow of Orange River. Since partial clouds had been formed over the river which resulted in heavy rainfall and that had caused overflow in the river.  

Comparison and contrast between the key stakeholders in such natural disasters in view of affected communication and suggestion of policies:

The government of the United States had set up a separate fund for the sole purpose of relief and aid to the affected people of the Hurricane Sandy. More than 2.2 million US dollar of money were collected and total 35 safety-net health centers were formed by the government (Direct Relief, 2018). On the contrary, the occurrence of flood in African region especially in South Africa their government has taken many measures to safe flood affected victims. The government of South Africa had to invest almost $211 for the damage control and rescue of their citizen. Being one of the third world countries, the Government of Africa had to lend the lion’s share of the said amount of money from the World Bank and Red Cross. The social development department of South Africa provided many blankets, mattresses, clothing and food parcels after the occurrence of this flood. In case of the natural calamity occurred in USA, National Association of Community Health Centres (NACHC) collaborated with Direct Relief to support the patients and the affected families of Hurricane Sandy and added more than 1.5 million US dollar to the fund. The measures taken for restoring communication by the government of USA during natural disaster were an interactive exchange of information and opinion amongst individual and groups with the goal of assessing, minimising and regulated risks. Informing people about the types of natural disaster and its causes makes the people knowledgeable to respond to situation quickly and reduce the level of crisis.

On the other hand, the occurrence of this flood the government had to rebuild the schools, hospitals which is very much required for the health of victims and education of children (Blaikie, et al., 2014). South African natural disaster management follows systematic, well-planned series of action which comprises of different tools and techniques such as objective utilising, availing of resources and setting a specific timeline. This was further followed by setting up of relief camps in disaster-prone zones to keep the people informed about the natural disaster.

Comparison and contrast between the key stakeholders in such natural disasters

Both the countries need to identify the hazard-prone areas and the risk about it, informing the people about the consequences and potential threats looming with it. Further social relief camps and widespread strong social network can be major benefit during and after natural disaster (Jamba.org.za, 2018). Social reliefs forums need to be arranged and informing should be spread about what should be the primary steps and actions during natural disaster. Evacuation and mobility of access should be present so as victims can be taken into safer place. Since South Africa is a poor country itself, it had managed to restore the total affected communication network in Botswana taking more than one year of time. Whereas, being one of the richest countries in the world, USA took only 45 days to mend for the losses it faced.

The environment of USA mainly consists of mostly tropical rainforests all along, whereas the climate of South Africa is warm and sunny due to a geographical location is near to equator. Therefore the natural disaster commonly occurs in US are hail storm, hurricane,and heavy snowfall. Whereas in South Africa the main environmentalconcernsis floods and heavy rains along with sunburns(Live Science, 2018). Therefore both the countries need to set up relief camps and regulatory bodies such as European Union and USA’s United Nation Organisation. Through this activities, the natural disaster can be mitigated in both the countries. On the contrary, lack of environment policies creates issues for controlling devastating effect of the floodin the distinct locations of South Africa. Support from the government of international countries such as USA, Japan or Australia has provided a chance to install flood protection tools required to gain an in-depth idea about the devastating impact of such natural calamity. 

Conclusion

The above report compares the causes and impacts of the Hurricane Sandy that hit the United States of America in 2012 with the devastating flood in South Africa that took place in the year 2011. The brief analysis of the measures taken by both the governments of USA and South Africa shows the actual difference of the aid received by richand poor countries. The report also suggests some policies considered by the government of both countries should take to avert such casualties after any natural calamity.

References

Answers Africa, 2018. 10 of the Worst Natural Disasters in African History. [Online] Available at: https://answersafrica.com/10-of-the-worst-natural-disasters-in-african-history.html[Accessed 28 May 2018].

Blaikie, P., Cannon, T., Davis, I. & Wisner, B., 2014. At risk: natural hazards, people's vulnerability and disasters.. london: Routledge.

CNN, 2018. Hurricane Sandy Fast Facts. [Online] Available at: https://edition.cnn.com/2013/07/13/world/americas/hurricane-sandy-fast-facts/index.html[Accessed 28 May 2018].

Direct Relief, 2018. Direct Relief: Hurricane Sandy Response. [Online] Available at: https://www.directrelief.org/emergency/hurricane-sandy-relief-and-recovery/[Accessed 28 May 2018].

Fema.gov, 2018. Disaster Emergency Communications Division | FEMA.gov. [Online] Available at: https://www.fema.gov/disaster-emergency-communications-division[Accessed 29 MAY 2018].

Hughes, A., St Denis, L., Palen, L. & Anderson, K., 2014. Online public communications by police & fire services during the 2012 Hurricane Sandy. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on human factors in computing systems, 1(1), pp. 1505-1514.

Jamba.org.za, 2018. A revision of communication strategies for effective disaster risk reduction: A case study of the South Durban basin, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. [Online]  Available at: https://jamba.org.za/index.php/jamba/article/view/132/269 [Accessed 29 may 2018].

Live Science, 2018. Weather or Climate: What Caused Hurricane Sandy?. [Online] Available at: https://www.livescience.com/24377-weather-climate-hurricane-sandy.html
[Accessed 28 May 2018].