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Designing for Disaster Relief

by Michael James Casey, December 8, 2010


This report is an examination of the logistical and architectural responses that have been enacted
by governments and non-government organizations (NGOs) in the wake of catastrophic emergen-
cies throughout the world. Defined as “a natural or manmade hazard that has come to fruition”, di-
sasters are always characterized by widespread physical destruction and chaos. Whether natural
or manmade, disaster agents are the precipitating events that lead to this great loss of life, physical
property, and livelihoods. In addition to the the death and destruction that results directly from
such events, disaster agents have a lasting effect on survivors, exposing the vulnerability of a group
or groups in such a way that their ability to live is directly threatened. The report will begin with a
discussion of the logistics of relief as administered by major aid organizations, followed by specif-
ic case studies of historic and contemporary disaster relief strategies and an assessment of their suc-
cesses and failures. The conclusion will be a discussion of the role that media plays in relief efforts
and how developed societies are instrumental in deploying assistance to disaster victims. Going be-
yond a simple taxonomy of the tent cities and trailer parks that crop up in the wake of hurricanes
and earthquakes, I will seek to demonstrate that the logistics of relief delivery are the most critical
determinant of success in disaster relief situations, in terms of lives saved and qualities of life restored.

The Logistics of Relief

We are living in an era when information has the ultimate responsibility for deploying
become the top commodity to control, with assistance lies with the stricken nation7.
search engines and twenty four hour news Whether or not outside intervention is
cycles to enable constant streams of data and appropriate for a nation’s relief efforts is
media. When disasters occur these days, im- largely determined by the scale of the disaster,
ages of the destruction and stories directly from and the international community cannot even
the source are available instantaneously, which begin provide aid to disaster victims without
draws an initial spike in the world’s attention the specific request of the recipient govern-
to the plight of a population in some remote ment. While it can be assumed that the poorer
corner of the globe. Although this initial peak the country the more likely it is to be lacking in
in concern from those in the developed world disaster planning and preventative measures11,
compels international aid organizations to co- a disaster such as Hurricane Katrina proves
ordinate relief efforts, in any disaster situation that rich, highly developed nations can also fall

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short in providing their citizens the most basic
life requirements in the wake of great destruction.

The reasons for failure do not result from a lack


of available resources, but rather from the failure
of the many vested interests - multiple levels of
government and NGOs - to communicate with
each other and effectively coordinate the de-
ployment of food, temporary shelters, and other
raw relief materials. Weaknesses in the manage-
ment of human capital within organizations San Francisco Earthquake, 1906
like the United Nations, Red Cross, UNESCO,
Unicef, Oxfam can result in errors and short- Owing to its proximity to a major seismic fault
comings in the distribution of relief goods and line, San Francisco has a long history of con-
services to victims7. Because each of these en- tending with and preparing for earthquakes. The
tities operates independently, their methods most destructive quake to ever strike the city
of implementation and operational policies occurred on the morning of April 18, 1906,
vary and may even conflict with each other. and resulted in substantial building loss and
a widespread conflagration that claimed over
The first step in the disaster planning process 3,000 lives. Government intervention in relief
is determining the capacity of a population to for this early twentieth century disaster con-
meet their most basic needs of food, shelter, and sisted of the construction 5,600 housing units
sanitation. In most large-scale disasters, there is in city parks, with costs varying from $100 to
a great need for external assistance, and many $700 each. These temporary settlements were
emergency programs are imposed on disaster- built by union carpenters, and were gradu-
affected communities that suffer from a lack of ally transported out of the camps as rebuilding
involvement or concern by the affected popula- progressed, eventually providing many the
tion and other stakeholders3. The delivery of dry opportunity to own their first homes. Within
foodstuffs, blankets, clothing, and bottled water three years of the quake, 20,000 permanent build-
is a fairly straightforward act of repeated dispen- ings had been reconstructed, representing an
sation at crucial locations, but providing short impressive 70% of the buildings destroyed1. The
and long term shelter for displaced populations swift pace of San Francisco’s recovery after the
that are scattered over many miles is a respon- 1906 quake points to the nation’s growing pros-
sibility that requires substantially more money, perity and the city’s strategic location as a com-
raw materials, and logistical consideration. The mercial port for the Pacific coast, and presents a
most common causes of death in refugee camp stark contrast to the pace of relief seen more re-
children is diarrhea and pneumonia, caused by cently in the Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina.
viruses found in contaminated drinking water3.
Therefore, sanitary bathing quarters are always Bam Earthquake, Iran, 2003
an imperative requirement for relief architec-
ture, with access to clean water and proper drain- This 6.6 magnitude quake struck near the Bam
age infrastructure a crucial determinant of the settlement, in the Kerman province of eastern
hygiene and overall quality of life in relief camps. Iran on December 26, 2003, killing over 25,000
people. Within days of the disaster a population
The following is a series of case studies for of 125,000 had been placed in temporary tents,
several different historic and contemporary provided swiftly by the Iranian Red Crescent
disasters, and their relief management strategies. Society (IRCS), which coordinated closely with

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local provincial governments in tent distribu- these structures fairly easily, greatly aiding in
tion and placement2. Most families that owned relief implementation and improvement in
a house preferred to stay within walking distance the quality of life for displaced populations.
of their property, even when all that was left was
rubble. The most common complaint among
members of the population was the lack of toilets
and showers, making the construction of these
facilities a top priority for the IRCS relief efforts.

The authorities in charge of relief efforts in


Bam considered using prefabricated sanitation
modules in public places to meet these needs,
but aid agencies rarely selected this option due
to expense and the constant need for mainte-
nance of public facilities2. Instead of shipping in
elaborate manufactured trailers, the first wave of Kashimir Earthquake, Pakistan, 2005
relief workers relied on local and readily avail-
able materials such as wooden or lightweight This magnitude 7.6 earthquake struck northern
metal poles, cloths, traps, and sheets of plywood Pakistan on October 8, 2005, affecting neigh-
to satisfy the sanitary requirements of victims. boring India and Afghanistan and causing the
These rudimentary relief facilities consisted of a deaths of over 75,000 people. Leaders of relief
meter deep hole in the ground, filled with bricks efforts for this particular disaster suffered ma-
for wastewater drainage from showers, and jor challenges in coordination, mainly by rely-
covered by boards supporting a metal “squat- ing on a cluster approach that divided victim
ting plate” for toilets2. Predictably, the Iranian needs and human resources into ten categories
women were reluctant to use these temporary (shelter, food/nutrition, sanitation, commu-
showers due to the lack of privacy they afforded. nication, etc.) without an overall implementa-
tion plan or central governing body. Several
In this situation, Oxfam was unique among the international agency networks operated with
other aid organizations in its choice of relief ar- a measure of autonomy in needs assessment,
chitecture. Instead of prefabricated trailers, Ox- procurement, distribution, and reporting5. In or-
fam’s program consisted of constructing or repar- der to distribute the vast quantities of construc-
ing toilets and showers in the villages outside the tion materials needed for reconstruction, approx-
city, opting for brick structures built with local imately ninety different aid distribution agencies
materials and labor. The remains of standing but asked the UN Joint Logistics Center to help
heavily damaged masonry buildings were utilized coordinate the movements of their cargo. The
to their fullest extent after repair and seismic rein- extremely rugged topography of the Kashimir
forcement2. Builders of the new bathing and liv- made transportation capacity along narrow
ing facilities used a traditional material palette of mountain roads a significant relief constraint.
clay bricks and limestone foundations, but with
walls and roofs as light as possible and thicker On top of transportation challenges, hundreds
columns. Showers were built with 13 inch thick of private aid organizations operating alongside
columns and brick arched roofs topped with clay multiple levels of government lead to egregious
and reinforced with steel beams, providing ex- overlaps and disparities in aid distribution. For
cellent thermal insulation and privacy for users2. example, the Pakistani military and health clus-
Due to wide familiarity with the construction ter of NGOs both constructed field hospitals
type, local masons were capable of replicating according to their own independent assessments,

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resulting in either too many hospitals and Once the Federal Emergency Management
clinics in one location and not enough in Administration (FEMA) realized the scope of
another7. Across commodity types, delivery the destruction and totaled the displaced, they
decisions and outcomes were more determined implemented a plan to house the newly homeless
by terrain than by population size or degree in what they considered the most cost and time
of destruction. By March of 2006, Pakistani effective venue, intermodal trailers. When con-
authorities had dissolved all the formal camps sidering the location of the trailer parks, FEMA
for the displaced, dispatching families to the identified three different site types: 1) private
roadheads of their destroyed villages and leaving property, 2) preexisting commercial trailer
them to fend largely for themselves5. As well as parks, and 3) greenfields and undeveloped farm-
being a tale of caution for disorganized man- land4. A trailer park requires a certain amount of
agement of aid entities, the case of the Kashi- surface to “breathe” properly, pointing to green-
mir earthquake relief efforts shows that among fields as a good option. However, the people
disasters, the nuances of topography and set- who were going to live in these parks needed re-
tlement patterns are very important as well. liable access to healthcare and education, mean-
ing that locations closer to the urban core were
critical in FEMA’s considerations of trailer sites.

From the beginning of the planning process for


FEMA relief camps, there was enormous local
opposition in towns that were considered for
accommodating the temporary settlements. Just
as any new building development encounters
opposition from locals, prevailing stereotypes
about trailer parks and their effects on housing
values drove the hostility towards these FEMA
Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, 2005 neighborhoods. This xenophobia can be attrib-
uted to deeply engrained racial inequalities in
In the years leading up to this most recent and the southern U.S., the more general “not in my
calamitous American natural disaster, there was backyard” (NIMBY) phenomena, or just a lack
no shortage of speculation as to what might of empathy among people who perceived the
happen if a strong enough hurricane were to disaster victims as different from them. When
strike low-lying New Orleans. These scientists asked whether or not they would mind hav-
and climatologists saw the realization of their ing a temporary trailer park in their neighbor-
what-ifs on August 29, 2005, when Hurricane hood, almost 65% of black respondents said
Katrina made landfall and devastated New Or- that they would not mind at all compared to
leans and much of the Gulf Coast. Of the 1,816 just 32% of white respondents4. The potential
deaths attributed to the storm, the vast share number of citizens who were angered by the
(over 1,500) were from Louisiana and more spe- trailer park placement far outweighed those
cifically, the New Orleans metropolitan area. who would be served by the temporary shelters.

In the immediate wake of the damage, the middle


and mobile classes of New Orleans dispersed to
regional relief cities like Baton Rouge and Hous-
ton, while thousands who lacked the means to
travel formed a sudden refugee population in
the deserted core of a previously thriving city.

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The preparations and response of FEMA in the playgrounds. schoolyards, soccer fields,
case of Katrina fell far short of the expectations plazas, parks, and Haiti’s only golf course. In
for such a developed nation. With the media the absence of any authority during the quake’s
machine spinning full throttle on the story of immediate aftermath, survivors formed their
the storm and its devastating impacts, it was own security brigades, while doctors set up
impossible not to see how Katrina dispropor- impromptu clinics to treat the injured6.
tionately impacted the black community that
had called the low-lying wards their home.
Because of sedimentary deposits along the Mis-
sissippi River, valuable riverfront properties
in New Orleans tend to be elevated compared
to less valuable properties further inland, as
a result, there was a concentration of low-in-
come populations in the lowest-lying areas1.

It would be unfair to judge government disas-


ter relief and resource allocation based on racial
factors that preceded a disaster, but the fact
remains that five years later the predomi-
nantly black and low income neighborhoods The unprecented scope and widely broadcast
still contain wide swaths of flood ravaged images of destruction soon resulted in an out-
homes, while the more affluent districts that pouring of support for Haiti from the interna-
flooded have mostly been restored. The decrepit tional community. As a number of well-heeled
state of many properties in the Lower Ninth relief organizations lined up to help, logistical
Ward owes to a lack of private reconstruction conflicts ensued between these aid entities and
funds, partially because many insurance com- the U.S. military, which had seized control of the
panies won’t cover flood damage, contend- Port-au-Prince airport and was giving priority to
ing that the hurricane and its subsequent ef- troop and heavy equipment deployments rather
fects were not a “wind-driven occurrence”1. than food and clothing6. Additionally, many aid
organizations would only conduct food distribu-
Haiti Earthquake, 2010 tion in the presence of armed troops, an ultimate-
ly ineffective means of controlling the melee that
often characterizes refugee food distribution.
As an island country with a long history of pov-
erty and injustice, Haiti was the last nation in the Most of the official plans for rebuilding Haiti
western hemisphere that could handle a calami- call for decentralization and re-investment in
tous earthquake like the one that occurred on agriculture. The government is encouraging
January 12, 2010. The epicenter of this magni- the 600,000 people who fled devastated Port-
tude 7.0 earthquake was just miles outside of the au-Prince for the countryside to stay there6.
capital city, Port-au-Prince, and resulted in the in- Although Haiti was able to produce the bulk
stantaneous collapse of hundreds of thousands of of its own food for consumption just thir-
buildings and a staggering loss of life within them. ty years ago, previous military juntas which
were supported by the U.S. government have
Within hours of the quake, relief camps natural- shifted the country toward consuming imported
ly formed as dazed survivors sought shelter far cheaper rice and beans from America, undercut-
away from buildings and walls. The millions of ting the native farmers’ ability to compete and
suddenly homeless occupied streets, empty lots, decimating a once vital agricultural economy6.

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To fix this cycle of dependency will require
more than just the $23 million requested from
the UN6 to help Haitian farmers obtain seed
and fertilizer. Haiti needs strong government
leadership and a comprehensive strategy for re-
viving local food growth to wean the nation off
of the handouts that are currently sustaining it.

Six months after the January quake, there were


still over a million people (10% of the country’s
population) in Port-au-Prince and surround-
ing environs living in tent cities. With poor
sanitation and security features, these crude hu- Conclusion
man settlements are ill-suited for the rainy sea-
sons that plague this Caribbean country each The effects of Hurricane Katrina and the Haitian
summer. During particularly long downpours, earthquake are still being felt among the large
residents have no choice but to stand above the displaced populations that resulted from both
damp ground for hours on end, unable to sit or disasters. The previously discussed catastrophe
rest as they wait for the rain to pass and their relief strategies convey a variety of lessons that
mud floors to dry out. To cope with this increas- should be considered in the mitigation of future
ingly dire situation, government officials have disasters. The earthquakes in Pakistan and Haiti
been asking donors for better tents and more showed that quick aid can be as disruptive as no
durable forms of temporary housing that can aid at all, if survivor needs are not carefully de-
potentially shelter refugees for years, as the city termined and classified beforehand. The state of
works on rebuilding its permanent structures8. Haiti’s agricultural capacity and plans for post-
quake consumption and settlement patterns
One semi-permanent housing option is to relo- demonstrate how a community must have the
cate the tent dwellers into unused shipping con- ability to restore itself with its own cop-
tainers, many of which are already being utilized ing mechanisms, instead of relying on in-
by UN officials for field offices and certain pub- cessant handouts that destroy the suc-
lic amenities like showers. Another idea that has cess and confidence of local farmers11.
been put forth is to use readily available materials
to build stable, waterproof homes out of widely Global media outlets play a crucial role in the
available materials such as paper tubes and plastic process of securing aid for disaster victims and
tarps. The man behind these proposals is Shigeru maintaining concern among the well-to-do in
Ban, an acclaimed Japanese architect who has developed nations. Aside from the victims and
previous experience in designing shelters for workers directly involved with relief efforts,
the refugees of Asian earthquakes and African journalists are the main constructors of disaster
genocides. He claims that the materials neces- narratives and therefore have a great influence
sary for these paper and plywood structures can on securing international support for victims.
be procured locally, for under $300 per shelter. The exponential rise in venues for disseminat-
With the help of architecture students from a ing the stories and images of catastrophes that
technical college in the neighboring Domini- afflict the world has only augmented the reach
can Republic, Ban has begun the initial design of non-governmental relief organizations. This
and deployment of these housing prototypes in report has shown that while these international
Port-au-Prince and surrounding countrysides9. actors have a crucial role in getting a devastated

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population back on its feet, the solutions to
disaster displacement go far beyond monetary
donations. The physical design of relief camps,
provisions for sanitary infrastructure, and logis-
tical coordination of many vested interests are
the most crucial determinants of success or fail-
ure in mitigating despair in the wake of shared
tragedies.

References

1. Thomas Craemer, “Evaluating Racial Disparities in Hurricane Katrina Relief Using Direct Trailer
Counts in New Orleans and FEMA Records”, Public Administration Review. May/June 2010. 367 –
377. Accessed December 2, 2010.

2. Jean-Francois Pinera, Robert A. Reed, Cyrus Njiru, “Restoring sanitation services after an earthquake:
field experience in Bam, Iran”, Disasters. Volume 29, Issue 3. September 29, 2005. 222 – 236. Accessed
November 5, 2010.

3. Peter A. Harvey, “Planning environmental sanitation programmes in emergencies”, Disasters. Volume


29, Issue 2. May 23, 2005. 129 – 149. Accessed 2 December 2010.

4. Belinda Creel Davis, Valentina A. Bali, “Examining the Role of Race, NIMBY, and Local Politics in
FEMA Trailer Park Placement”, Social Science Quarterly. Volume 89, Number 5. December 5, 2008.
1176 – 1194. Accessed December 2, 2010.

5. Aldo Benini, Charles Conley, Brody Dittemore, Zachary Waksman, “Survivor needs or logistical
convenience? Factors shaping decisions to deliver relief to earthquake-affected communities, Pakistan
2005-6”, Disasters. Volume 27, Issue 4. October 30, 2006. Accessed November 5, 2010.

6. Reed Lindsay, “Haiti’s Excluded: How the earthquake aid regime sidelines those it is supposed to
help”, The Nation. March 29, 2010. 18 – 22. Accessed November 9, 2010.

7. Esther K. Hicks, Gregory Pappas, “Coordinating Disaster Relief After the South Asia Earthquake”,
Society. July/August 2006. 42 – 50. Accessed November 9, 2010.

8. Garry Pierre-Pierre, “Living under tents: Haitians brace themselves for rainy season”, The New York
Amsterdam News. February 25-March 3, 2010. 2. Accessed December 2, 2010.

9. Naomi Pollock, “Shigeru Ban Aims to Build Waterproof Shelters in Haiti”, Architectural Record On-
line. May 11, 2010. Accessed November 21, 2010. <http://archrecord.construction.com/news/daily/
archives/2010/100511shigeru_ban_shelters.asp >

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10. Jonathan Benthall, Disasters, Relief, and the Media. New York. I.B. Tauris & Co. Ltd. Publishers. ©
1993. 1 – 40.

11. Randolph C. Kent, Anatomy of Disaster Relief: The International Network in Action. London.
Pinter Publishers Ltd. © 1987. 1 – 68.

Image Sources

Page 1: http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/article95870.ece

Page 2: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/06/sci_nat_san_francisco_earth-
quake___1906/html/1.stm

Page 3: http://news.in.msn.com/gallery.aspx?cp-documentid=3482069&page=11

Page 4 (left): http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/dispatches/050901-01.html

Page 4 (right): http://www.daylife.com/photo/058ZbfO2wO154

Page 5: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Haiti-Earthquake-Diary/2010/0125/Haiti-earthquake-
diary-The-lives-within-the-tent-cities

Page 6: http://www.shigerubanarchitects.com/SBA_WORKS/SBA_PAPER/SBA_PAPER_6/SBA_
paper_6.html

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