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This study investigated pre-evacuation times and evacuation behaviors of vulnerable people during the 2018 flooding in Shimobara, Okayama, Japan, and the flood-triggered factory explosion, a natural hazard-triggered technological accident known as a natural-hazard-triggered technological accidents (Natech). This study examined factors that affected evacuation decisions and pre-evacuation time, estimated the evacuation time in case of no explosion and identified community disaster prevention organization response efforts for vulnerable people.

Interviews with all 18 vulnerable people who experienced the event were conducted. Multiple regression analysis was used to examine the effect of six factors on evacuation time and reasons for delayed evacuation.

Factors affecting evacuation decisions included the sound of the explosion, followed by recommendations from relatives and the community disaster prevention organization. Explosion-related injuries delayed early evacuation, but experience of previous disasters and damage had a positive effect on early evacuation. The explosion sound accelerated evacuation of non-injured people; however, explosion-related injuries significantly delayed evacuation of injured individuals. The Shimobara community disaster prevention organization’s disaster response included a vulnerable people registry, visits to all local households and a multilayered approach that enabled monitoring of all households.

This is the first study to examine the evacuation behavior of vulnerable people and community responses during a Natech event.

Natural disasters such as earthquake, flood and hurricane always threaten human life and societies. A major challenge is technological hazards triggered by such disasters, especially in metropolises and urban areas. Thus, these hazards have been the focus of interest in many countries, and suitable crisis management plans have been made to address them. The purpose of this study was to cluster technological hazards caused by natural disasters in urban areas.

According to literature, a set of 15 technological hazards was identified whose magnificence and interrelations were analysed using interpretive structural modelling technique. DEMATEL technique was used to determine internal relations among the hazards and to draw a network relation map.

The results revealed that dam failing, water supply disruption and building collapse form the base of the structural model.

The authors developed a structural model representing the hierarchy and interrelations among various elements of technological hazards caused by natural disaster. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this was the first attempt to reveal internal relations of Natech factors. Finally, some recommendations were proposed for crisis management according to research findings.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze public trust during the aftermath of technological and hybrid natural-technological/natech disasters – Hurricane Katrina (2005) and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear meltdown in Japan (2011). The work identifies common themes, actions and inactivity that can lead to citizens distrusting the government after disasters.

News reports from the two areas leading newspapers formed the body of the Hurricane Katrina and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear meltdown case studies. Of key interest were emerging themes of trust and/or distrust during the immediate impact phase of the disaster in addition to government failures and social breakdowns resulting in a loss of trust in government institutions and individual leaders.

The series of examples illustrate how specific action or in-action by local and federal governments served as a catalyst for a loss of trust in government institutions and individual leaders in government while proposing potential strategies to help public leaders reduce distrust during times of crisis.

The two limitations were the use of only newspapers and the passage of a new law in 2013, the “Specially Designated Secrets Protection Law,” designed to limit news reporting of the press in Japan on the issue of nuclear radiation exposure of the general public in Japan, some of the new data are not available.

The research concludes by offering specific ways to regain trust after a perception of failure during pre- and post-disaster management in the age of mega disasters. The paper lists several recommendations that can be practically implemented to develop a culture of transparent communication, civic engagement in planning processes and inspire trust among stakeholders.

While the paper identifies barriers to establishing trust among government agencies, the citizenry and private industry, it seeks to help inform policy frameworks regarding the importance of the government’s ability to sustain a strong sense of trust that engenders civic participation in preserving or regaining trust in the aftermath of disasters.

This study aims at investigating the evolution of disaster management by identifying the different phases it has gone through over time, and laying a ground for the next generation of disaster studies that focus on value-creating and value-adding activities.

An extensive review of the existing literature was made to develop an understanding of the evolution of disaster management. This study does not aim at assessing the tools or techniques used; rather it aims at identifying the major developments that took place over time.

Disaster management is a dynamic process. It has encountered/experienced different evolutionary phases that indicate that it has been developing over time. It continues to evolve until today as long as disasters occur. The nature and complexity of disasters are also changing. Most importantly, what seemed to be a practical approach for managing disasters yesterday might not fit for the use of today or tomorrow.

Understanding the evolution of disaster management mirrors the evolution of mankind and the ways people survived major incidents. As life itself evolves, disasters will continue to evolve which subsequently triggers the need for broader management insight to cope with.

This study traces the evolution of disaster management and the development of research and practice in this field over time. The existing literature rarely addresses the uniqueness of individual disasters and the need to treat them differently even the recurrent ones. To the best of the author’s knowledge, there is no single study that attempted to capture the evolution of disaster management during the 20th century until today. This study aims to achieve this goal.

This paper aims to theoretically and empirically demonstrate the role played by business continuity management (BCM) to address risks such as trade conflicts and natural disasters. This paper also answers whether compliance with international standards such as the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 22301 is adequate.

A case study of Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei is conducted to examine how a robust end-to-end BCM system has been established in two decades and in what way it has helped Huawei to efficiently maintain growth under pressure, such as being added to the “Entity List” and the pandemic.

Huawei case contributes to BCM theory in its approach to establishing the BCM system and its well-established BCM model. Huawei establishes and continually improves its BCM system by applying the Plan (establish), Do (implement and operate), Check (monitor and review) and Act (maintain and improve) cycle. Characterized as 4Ps: BCM policy, BCM process, incident management plan and business continuity plan, Huawei BCM system is shaped into a loop with end-to-end BCM process, covering all steps along its value chain – from suppliers and partners to Huawei itself and then on to its customers – with key initiatives for all domains such as R&D, procurement, manufacturing, logistics and global technical services. In practice, implementing international standards such as ISO 22301 enables Huawei to develop business continuity but not enough. Optimizing the BCM system is an ongoing effort, and BCM maturity is ever present: continually improving Huawei’s own BCM system and benchmarking against best practices available worldwide.

Apart from the case study, other methods such as counter-factual analysis can be used to further test whether Huawei’s BCM system is cost-effective. Another direction for future study is whether suggested BCM maturity levels should be supplemented into ISO 22301. In the digital age, how to use digitalization to ensure business continuity is a current issue not just for practitioners such as Huawei but also for researchers worldwide.

In practice, implementing international standards such as ISO 22301 enables Huawei to develop business continuity but not enough. Optimizing the BCM system is an ongoing effort, and BCM maturity is ever present: continually improving Huawei’s own BCM system and benchmarking against best practices available worldwide.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is one of the first studies to focus on how an organization continually improves the suitability, adequacy and effectiveness of its BCM system, with special attention to standards compliance.

Liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), known by its ecological qualities, making Algeria has since the 1980s carried out a policy of development of LPG fuel in substitution of traditional fuels and especially petrol. However, following a series of accidents (fires, explosions, etc). that occurred in 1999, 20 years after the introduction of the LPG in France these incidents led to the search for the strengthening of the safety of the installations by better or new technical and/or organizational measures. This strategy consists in establishing a balance between environmental protection and economic profitability while ensuring the safety aspect.

The approach used is quantitative risk analysis authors have identified the potential accident scenarios that consist of leakage and rupture of tanks depend on bow tie. According to the latter using PHAST software, to model these scenarios (thermal, overpressure and dispersion) and their effects on human beings and goods.

In this paper, it was noted that there are scenarios such as (jet fire, dispersion), are affected by atmospheric conditions (wind speed humidity), the stronger the wind, the higher the LPG spread unlike instant scenarios (1.3 s for the fireball and millisecond for the explosion) that have not been related to climatic conditions because they have a short duration on the one hand, and on the other hand, a safe distance is given in each phenomenon. Finally, some instructions for drivers and installers have been identified by protective and preventive action.

Based on a quantitative risk analysis, this work involves modelling potential accident scenarios such as (fireball, jet fire, flash fire and explosion) in the event of a gas leak and rupture in the tank. It aims to sensitize drivers and LPG kit installers, even to get a clear view on these accidental phenomena and how to avoid them.

In the aftermath of the Eastern Japan Earthquake in 2011, the Sendai Framework for Action introduced a new task called ‘Build Back Better (B3)’. This study discusses this new task and proposes an extended framework which strategically includes a pre-disaster period. This extended framework is named ‘Build Back Better, even Before Disaster (B⁴)’. The following points are observed:

SMART Governance under Persistent Disruptive Stressors (PDS) proposed by Okada offers an effective new methodology for systematically studying B⁴ problems.

For the purpose of actual practice and social implementation, we need to set up, then foster and repeatedly activate a communicative place, where participants meet openly, plan and act together step by step.

The place can be very small in size, particularly at the start but needs to be adaptively designed and recreated though a communicative process.

Yonmenkaigi System Method (YSM) serves as a useful media and tool for place-making and process design for involving stakeholders in making collaborative action development towards win–win solutions.

Finally, we consider the Case of the Merapi Volcano region in Indonesia to establish the above points.

Pakistan is one of the most climate change and natural disaster-affected countries in the globe, where the lives and livelihoods of people are repeatedly affected due to these natural disasters. Over the past few decades, the country has been impacted by numerous devastating floods, droughts, and storms. As a result, households face enormous complications, particularly those dwelling in disaster-prone areas. Therefore, this study intends to explore the status of household vulnerability and resilience practices of hazard-prone communities in Pakistan from existing literature. This study has identified the 17 most relevant documents. It argues that household vulnerability is increasing consistently with the increasing rate of disaster intensity. Frequent flooding, landslide, erosion, and crop loss are the leading causes of household vulnerability. This study reveals five types of household vulnerability components which look into several livelihood vulnerability indicators of Pakistani households. Moreover, the study unfolds that the main causes of disaster vulnerability are widespread crop loss, a lack of water, loss of soil fertility, and low socioeconomic situations. The major vulnerability components of dwellers are exposure (increasing summer duration, the rapid increase of population house build-up in the riparian areas, and increasing occurrence of hailstorms), sensitivity, low access to education facilities, human loss, diseases infestation, food insecurity, and social conflict), and less adaptive capacity (social networks, migration, poor emergency services, multiple income sources, and less access to the health facility). To address the household vulnerability, this study has also identified four key aspects of resilience, like social resilience, economic resilience, institutional resilience, and physical resilience. The findings will effectively help to understand the dynamics of household vulnerability and resilience and its measurement and management strategy from developed indicators.