Talk by Rohan Samarajiva at the Sahana Conference 2009, Colombo. Sri Lanka. March 24-25 2009.

1. Public Warning: Roles of
policymakers, regulators, private
sector & civil society
www.lirneasia.net
Rohan Samarajiva
Sahana 2009 Conference
24 - 25 March 2009, Colombo

2. Agenda
The presence and absence of early warnings
Organizational problems must be solved if the
potential of early warning technologies is to be fully
realized
Overall division of labor
Issuance of warning –Government
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Transmission of warning –Telecom operators
Evacuation and response –First responders
(government and other)
Community preparedness –Community organizations
Identification of specific tasks and
responsibilities
Comments on government role

3. Cyclone Sidr
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4. Why declining deaths?
Year Cyclone Strength Deaths
1970 Bhola Category 3 300-500,000
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1970+21 Gorky Category 4 ~138,000
1970+37 Sidr Category 4 ~3,447

5. Completing the chain: Warning &
training at the last mile
Bangladesh reduced casualties (but not
damage to property & livelihoods) through
Communicating cyclone warnings to villages
through HF radios and trained volunteers
Easy-to-understand flag system at the last mile
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Cyclone shelters
People who trust the warnings and evacuate
Deaths from Sidr would have been less, if
not for false tsunami warning and evacuation
one month earlier (September 12th, 2007)

6. Cyclones & tsunamis
Both effect the Bay of Bengal
Tsunamigenic earthquakes in Sunda Trench every
year since 2004 (except 2008)
Difference is lead time
2-3 days for cyclones
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90 mts to 6 hours for Bay of Bengal countries
other than Indonesia
Simply replicating Bangladesh is not enough
Bangladesh model used 1990s communication
technology
Much has happened since (e.g. CB/SMS)

7. Physical and symbolic worlds, absent linking
technologies
Mediated
interpersonal
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Symbolic world
where action
Physical world where originates
hazards occur

8. The physical, the symbolic & their linking
through ICTs, simplified
Warnings (telecom & media)
Mediated
interpersonal
TV, Radio &
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Physical world where Cell Symbolic world
hazards occur broadcasts where action
originates
Warnings (telecom)
More time to run; more lives saved

9. Early warning chain (standard form)
Media & Telecom
Operators
www.lirneasia.net
National early
Citizens
warning First responders
center

10. Early warning chain (community based;
applicable to Last-Mile HazInfo project)
Emergency Response Plan coordinator
National early
Media
warning
Govt 1st Responders
center
ERP1
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ICT ERP2
Guard
SCDMC Villagers
ians
From domestic &
ERP3
international
sources
ERP4
SCDMC will never issue warnings; only alerts so that communities
can be better prepared to receive the warning from government

11. ICTs used in reaching communities
Remote Alarm Device
GSM Mobile Phone
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CDMA Fixed Phone
Addressable Radios for Emergency Very Small Aperture
Alerts Terminals

12. Which work best?
Eight modes (individual and combined) tested
Reliability and effectiveness (composite measures)
Complementary redundancy
Comparison of Reliability and Effectiveness of ICT as a
Warning Technology in a LM-HWS
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0.75
AREA+MOP 0.71
0.75
AREA+FXP 0.89
0.43
AREA+RAD 0.71
ICT modes
0.05
AREA 0.59
0.24
MOP 0.27
0.26
FXP 0.47
0.09
RAD
Effectiveness
0.04
VSAT
Reliability
Control Group 0.15

13. Community
Forms of training that will work
Levels of organizational strength
Importance of emergency response plans
Plan without simulation is no plan
Simulation without plan cannot be done
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14. Telecom and e-media are important,
but are only part of the solution
Ability to move information at the speed of light can
increase time to act to reduce risks of disasters
Many organizational problems must be solved
At level of community
At level of first responders
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At national early warning center
Among the carriers of alerts and warnings
Effective warning must be complemented by
preparedness plans, evacuation capabilities, etc.
If we are to save livelihoods and property, in addition
to lives, a lot more has to be done on risk reduction

15. Early warning: who should do
what?
Early warning is a classic public good
Government must supply
Early warning is based on incomplete, probabilistic
Government must
information and judgment
take the responsibility of issuing
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warning/alert
75% of tsunami warnings in the Pacific are false; false
warnings can be dangerous
Government gets hazard information from external or
internal sources
Regional warning cannot be simply transmitted
Judgment must be applied before national
warnings/alerts are issued for specific areas

16. Early warning: who should do
what?
Operators of telecom networks and electronic
media (public-sector and private-sector) must
transmit the message to first responders and citizens
Ground-level first responders must play the key
role in evacuations and response
Community preparedness is important if warnings
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community-based
are to save lives
organizations (e.g., Sarvodaya) are best at
this
Includes improving the ability of communities to
receive warnings and alerts

17. Responsibilities at warning center
and in communication to media, etc.
Media &Telecom
Operators
www.lirneasia.net
National early
Citizens
warning First responders
center

18. Early Warning Center Media &
Telcos
Protocols for fast decision making re
issuance of warnings/alerts [Internal to
government]
Procedure for issuing large number of
warnings/alerts quickly and reliably using
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multiple media, including acknowledgements
and redundancy [Decision is government’s;
but best to use Common Alerting Protocol
based single-input, multi-output, multi-
language software solution]

19. Media, telcos, first responders to
public
Procedures for verification and acknowledgement
[jointly worked out with government]
Standard formats, including rules on what is
communicated in what form [jointly worked out with
government]
Rules for use of cell broadcasts [jointly worked out
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with government]
Government first responders to public [procedures
appropriate for different settings decided locally]
Other first responders (e.g., Sarvodaya, hotels) to
public [procedures appropriate for different settings
decided locally]

20. Prior planning essential
Wide variety of procedures to be decided
Important that they be formulated and tried
out prior to a disaster
Improvisation in the midst of a crisis is
inappropriate
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Updating of procedures at regular intervals
Drills and training of critical actors, also at regular
intervals

21. Lessons for the last mile
Media &Telecom
Operators
www.lirneasia.net
National early
Citizens
warning First responders
center

22. Community preparedness
Each community is unique emergency response
plans cannot be the same
Importance of emergency response plans
Plan without simulation is no plan
Simulation without plan cannot be done
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Plans need to be updated regularly
Training and awareness raising needed
Primarily for communities, though government may
exercise oversight if it has adequate expertise and
resources
Communities can learn from each other if the
environment is created

23. A mild critique of government
priorities
Too often, government looks at the problem
in terms of
Laws and regulations, instead of ground-level
action (that is then codified into practical legal
frameworks)
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Sri Lanka Disaster Management Act passed after
the tsunami has grandiose schemes of
committees reporting to committees reporting to
councils
But the Act does not include provisions for
funding from the Consolidated Fund unable to
do much without external help

24. A mild critique of government
priorities
Too often government units get entangled in turf
battles and lose sight of what the overall object is
Disasters cross administrative boundaries
In Sri Lanka, geological expertise is at Geological
Survey and Mines Bureau; tsunami hazard information
authority is Met Department; tide gauges are under
National Aquatic Resources Authority; warning
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authority is Disaster Management Center; telecom
operators are governed by Telecom Regulatory
Commission; media are under Media Ministry
Essential to develop non-territorial approaches to
manage unavoidable turf issues
Disasters are too big for one government department,
let alone government as a whole need to work with
everyone to save lives, livelihoods and property

25. A mild critique of government
priorities
There is too much emphasis on the
international and not enough on the
community level
Community level work is hard; much harder than
attending international workshops
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But that is the key to risk reduction

26. Take aways
Disasters are too big for any one entity
the problem is large enough for everyone to
contribute
Government must take the lead in creating the
right environment for productive cooperation by
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all
Responsibilities must be assigned based on core
competencies
Plans are not plans absent simulation
We need to look at what works, not what is on
paper

27. Way forward
Disseminate lessons to improve public
warning systems
More trials in specific contexts if needed
Improve community based response
In Sri Lanka, 1,000 Sarvodaya villages 15,000
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Sarvodaya villages 30,000 villages
Develop sustainable public-private models of
sustaining community training and
dissemination of hazard information
Improve multi-lingual, multi-modal Common
Alerting Protocol (CAP)

28. Our collaboration with Sahana
Risk Reduction
Mitigation
Sahana now
Prevention
Recovery
Moved into
the “pre” &
www.lirneasia.net
warning
Sahana space
at inception
Preparedness
Response
LIRNEasia
+ Sahana
work
Hazardous event Warning Key role for telecom
& electronic media
LIRNEasia space