Although the education sector sustained considerable damage in the Great East Japan Earthquake (GEJE), it also played a key role in protecting lives. Importantly, it provided both civil protection hardware and software: school buildings served as evacuation shelters and transition shelters, and...

Risk communication is an important component of disaster risk management (DRM) because it shapes people's perceptions of risk and influences their actions with respect to disaster preparedness and disaster response. It also influences the intervention decisions that are made throughout the...

The Great East Japan Earthquake (GEJE) caused immense damage and congestion in telephone infrastructure, including 1.9 million fixed-line services and 29,000 mobile phone base stations. Government radio communication infrastructure was also seriously damaged. Voice messages were widely used to...

Education is the key to risk reduction, be it environmental management or disaster risk reduction, and is a process which needs to be embedded at different levels of management and practices to collectively reduce the risk. While school education forms the foundations of the knowledge cycle, for...

Local communities play a key role in preparing for disastrous events such as the Great East Japan Earthquake (GEJE), and are normally the first responders to take action. On March 11, 2011, Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) were active in the disaster response and saved countless human lives....

Community evacuation measures should be the centerpiece of Disaster Risk Management (DRM) systems. Because the Sanriku region has suffered from frequent tsunamis, its local communities have passed their knowledge from generation to generation, mainly by constructing commemorative monuments and...