Visit from US Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA
The last two weeks the Centre for Climate and Safety at Karlstad University has been visited by two experts on natural disaster modeling from the US Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA.
The second week of the stay has been dominated by work with Swedish application of Hazus. Casey Zuzak, Jesse Rozelle and Tonje Grahn working with the Hazus software.
Jesse Rozelle, the Acting Branch Chief for FEMA HQ’s Actuarial and Catastrophic Modeling Branch, and Casey Zuzak, Senior Risk Analyst on the same department are in Karlstad in connection to a research project at Karlstad University led by CCS-researcher Dr. Tonje Grahn.
- The assistance and expertise of Rozelle and Zuzak is of greatest importance for my work, says Tonje Grahn. FEMA has come a long way in the development of methodology and tools in my field of research and has also been very open in sharing their knowledge. The goal is to develop similar models for the Swedish natural hazard context.
Huge interest for tools and methods
Many of the methods and tools developed and used by FEMA are of huge interest also to risk managers in Sweden. Examples mentioned by Grahn are the US National Flood Insurance Program; the agency's multi-risk model National Risk Index and Hazus – a hazard loss estimation tool that combines models such as altitude models, hydrological models, exposure and damage functions to assess physical damage and economical losses from earthquakes, hurricanes, riverine/coastal flooding, and tsunamis.
Jesse Rozelle and Casey Zuzak also visited CCS RiskLab and tried out the Floodville game together with a group of CCS researchers.
– In my research project, funded by the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency, MSB, the goal is to analyze the suitability and transferability of FEMA’s Hazus methodology and software, to Sweden and Swedish conditions, says Grahn.
During two intense weeks in Sweden Rozelle and Zuzak have presented their and FEMA’s work at several seminars and a conference arranged by the Centre for climate and safety at the Karlstad CCC. There has also been some long workdays at Karlstad University with the Swedish adaptation of Hazus.
- Comparing risk assessment methods with Dr. Grahn as well as the teams at CCS and MSB has been very insightful, says Jesse Rozelle at FEMA. At the FEMA Natural Hazards Risk Assessment Program we’re always looking for ways to enhance our risk modeling methods. Working with our colleagues in the disaster risk sciences at research organizations such as the team here at Karlstad University help to make this possible.
The visit to Karlstad has been a follow-up on a visit by Tonje Grahn to Denver, CO, USA during the fall 2018.
Conference presentations
Jesse Rozelle
Casey Zuzak
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