2. LESSONS LEARNED FROM PAST NOTABLE DISASTERS TURKEY PART 4: WILDFIRES Walter Hays, Global Alliance for Disaster Reduction, Vienna, Virginia, USA

3. TURKEY

4. ISTANBUL

5. NATURAL HAZARDS THAT HAVE CAUSED DISASTERS IN TURKEY FLOODS STORMS EARTHQUAKES WILDFIRES ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE HIGH BENEFIT/COST FROM BECOMING DISASTER NRESILIENT GOAL: PROTECT PEOPLE AND COMMUNITIES

6. Natural Phenomena that Cause Disasters Planet Earth’s atmospheric- lithospheric interactions create situations favorable for Wildfires

7. WILDFIRES are conflagrations caused by lightning discharges (or acts of man) in wilderness areas close enough to one or more urban interfaces that they threaten people, property, infrastructure, and business enterprise.

8. SCIENCE OF WILDFIRES

9. ELEMENTS OF RISK AND DISASTER

10. HAZARDSHAZARDS ELEMENTS OF RISK FOR STORMS EXPOSUREEXPOSURE VULNERABILITYVULNERABILITY LOCATIONLOCATION RISKRISK

11. A WILDFIRE’S HAZARDS ARE POTENTIAL DISASTER AGENTS

12. WILDFIRE HAZARDS (AKA POTENTIAL DISASTER AGENTS) FIRE HOT GASES AND SMOKE HOT SPOTS BURNED OUT SLOPES (with increased susceptibility to insect infestation, erosion, and landslides)

13. WILDFIRE HAZARDS (AKA POTENTIAL DISASTER AGENTS) SUNDOWNER WINDS LOCAL CHANGES IN AIR QUALITY LOCAL CHANGES IN WEATHER

14. LIGHTNING STRIKES WILDFIRES (AKA FOREST FIRES) MANMADE FIRES PROXIMITY OF URBAN AREA TO THE WILDLAND FIRE WIND SPEED AND DIRECTION (DAY/NIGHT DIFFERENCES) DRYNESS HIGH TEMPERATURES LOCAL FUEL SUPPLY CAUSES OF DAMAGE DISASTER LABORATORIES

15. A DISASTER CAN HAPPEN WHEN THE POTENTIAL DISASTER AGENTS OF A WILDFIRE INTERACT WITH TURKEY’S COMMUNITIES

16. A DISASTER is --- --- the set of failures that overwhelm the capability of a community to respond without external help when three continuums: 1) people, 2) community (i.e., a set of habitats, livelihoods, and social constructs), and 3) complex events (e.g., wildfires, earthquakes,…) intersect at a point in space and time.

17. Disasters are caused by s ingle- or multiple-event natural hazards that, (for various reasons), cause extreme levels of mortality, morbidity, homelessness, joblessness, economic losses, or environmental impacts.

18. THE REASONS ARE... When it does happen, the functions of the community’s buildings and infrastructure will be LOST because they are UNPROTECTED with the appropriate codes and standards.

19. THE REASONS ARE... The community is UN- PREPARED for what will likely happen, not to mention the low-probability of occurrence— high-probability of adverse consequences event.

20. THE REASONS ARE... The community has NO DISASTER PLANNING SCENARIO or WARNING SYSTEM in place as a strategic framework for early threat identification and coordinated local, national, regional, and international countermeasures.

21. THE REASONS ARE... The community LACKS THE CAPACITY TO RESPOND in a timely and effective manner to the full spectrum of expected and unexpected emergency situations.

22. THE REASONS ARE... The community is INEFFICIENT during recovery and reconstruction because it HAS NOT LEARNED from either the current experience or the cumulative prior experiences.

23. Turkey has a land mass of 77.079 million hectares, of which 26 percent (20.199 million hectares) is forested.

24. In the period 1937-1996, a total of 60,434 fires burned a total of 1,464,928 hectares of Turkey’s forest land.

25. Although the number of fires has continued to increase since 1996, the area burned has decreased due to the effective use of technology in transportation, communication and fire suppression

26. WOOD FROM THE 1996 MARMARIS WILDFIRE

27. TURKEY HAS MANY COMMUNITIES THAT ARE AT RISK FROM FREQUENT WILDFIRES

28. UNFORTUNATELY, MOST OF TURKEY’S WILDFIRES ARE MANMADE

29. DISTRIBUTION OF WILDFIRES The distribution of the fires in different regions is as follows: 41% of the fires occur in the Aegean; 24% in the Mediterranean; 22% in Marmara; and 13% in other regions

30. SO, WILDFIRES ARE INEVITABLE EVERY YEAR IN TURKEY ---WE DON’T HAVE TO WAIT VERY LONG FOR ANOTHER REMINDER OF THE IMPORTANCE OF BECOMING WILD- FIRE DISASTER RESILIENT.

31. THE ALTERNATIVE TO A WILDFIRE DISASTER IS WILDFIRE DISASTER RESILIENCE

32. TURKEY’S COMMUNITIES DATA BASES AND INFORMATION HAZARDS: GROUND SHAKING GROUND FAILURE SURFACE FAULTING TECTONIC DEFORMATION TSUNAMI RUN UP AFTERSHOCKS WILDFIRE HAZARDS INVENTORY VULNERABILITY LOCATION WILDFIRE RISK RISK ACCEPTABLE RISK UNACCEPTABLE RISK WILDFIRE DISASTER RESILIENCE PREPAREDNESS PROTECTION FORECASTS/SCENARIOS EMERGENCY RESPONSE RECOVERY and RECONSTRUCTION POLICY OPTIONS

33. STRATEGIC COLLABORATION (I.E., WORKING TOGETHER ON A COMMON GOAL) IS THE KEY TO BECOMING STORM DISASTER RESILIENT

34. DISASTER RESILIENCE STRATEGIES FOR WILDFIRES PURPOSE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENTS WIN THE FIGHT PURPOSE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENTS WIN THE FIGHT TECHNIQUE PRE- AND POST - WILDFIRE ASSESSMENTS FOCUS INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL RESOURCES TECHNIQUE PRE- AND POST - WILDFIRE ASSESSMENTS FOCUS INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL RESOURCES

35. LESSONS LEARNED ABOUT DISASTER RESILIENCE ALL WILDFIRES PREPAREDNES FOR THE EXPECTED AND UNEXPEDTED IS ESSENTIAL FOR DISASTER RESILIENCE

36. LESSONS LEARNED ABOUT DISASTER RESILIENCE ALL WILDFIRES EARLY WARN- ING (THE ISS) AND EVACU- ATION ARE ESSENTIAL FOR DISASTER RESILIENCE

37. LESSONS LEARNED ABOUT DISASTER RESILIENCE ALL WILDFIRES TIMELY EMERGENCY RESPONSE IS ESSENTIAL FOR DISASTER RESILIENCE