Telecommunications and natural disasters in rural Australia: The role of digital capability in building disaster resilience

Telecommunications infrastructure and services are essential for rural communities to respond natural disasters, like bushfires, cyclones floods. Such disasters becoming increasingly frequent in Australia. This cross-disciplinary study draws together community disaster resilience digital capability concepts address a critical gap our understanding how individuals organisations can effectively prepare for, to, recover from using telecommunications. The adopts an ethnographic methodology, including semi-structured interviews workshops, Far North Queensland, A socio-technical approach enabled the authors analytically highlight both technical social aspects of at each phase resilience: preparedness, response, recovery. In contrast dominant focus on literature, this builds emerging work focused factors that facilitated by technologies. It particularly demonstrates capabilities contribute capital, competence, economic development, information communication. research problem is as Australia other parts country world experience more severe disasters.