GIS and disasters: Planning for catastrophe

Recent events, including the Indian Ocean tsunami, the hurricanes of the 2005 season, and the 7/7 and 9/11 terrorist attacks, have made us all acutely aware of the vulnerability of modern society. Knowing where such events have occurred and the geographic limits of their impacts is clearly important, particularly when combined with information on human populations, infrastructure, and other spatially distributed phenomena that may be relevant to response and recovery. But more generally, geographic information and the technologies that acquire, interpret, and disseminate such information (GIS, remote sensing, GPS, etc.) are clearly essential in all aspects of disaster, from preparedness, prevention, and protection through detection to response and eventual recovery. Geographic information and technology (GI&T) provide the basis for estimating and mapping risk, for planning evacuation routes and shelters, for determining areas where human populations are most likely to have been impacted following a disaster, and for assigning resources during recovery, among many other vital and important tasks.