European Geosciences Union
Division on Natural Hazards
President: Ira Didenkulova (nh@egu.eu)
Deputy President: Paolo Tarolli
(paolo.tarolli@unipd.it)
The Natural Hazards (NH) Division of the EGU covers all the geological and geophysical processes that can be hazardous and can produce damage to the environment and to the society. Therefore it is a place where scientists and researchers of various geo-disciplines meet with sociologists, economists and people responsible for territorial and urban defense and planning policies. The aim is to improve the understanding of the evolution of the processes and to discuss new technologies, methods and strategies to mitigate their disastrous effects. The Division is structured in nine Subdivisions covering specific hazards. Of these seven are listed here: hydro-meteorological, volcanic, landslide, earthquake-, sea and ocean, remote sensing and hazards, wildfire hazards. The eighth Subdivision covers biological and environmental hazards and in addition hazards not included in the previous ones. The ninth (natural hazards and society) focuses on the social aspects of the hazards, including development sustainability, emergency, warning, after-disaster resilience, etc. Most of the topics that are treated in the NH Division are also treated in other EGU Divisions, which is expected due to the intrinsic transversal nature of the NH Division. For example, earthquakes are the main interest of the Seismology Division, but they are also of interest here where the chief topics are, among others, how to evaluate vulnerability and risk, how to reduce the impact on human lives and society, how geo-scientists can contribute to a prompt recovery of a community affected by disasters.
The NH Division is one the historical Divisions of the EGU that was established since when EGU was founded and has been and is one of the largest divisions to which many geo-scientists provide steadily contributions of papers and ideas over the years.
As for all EGU Divisions, an Early Career Scientist Award is established also for the NH Division and is given to young researchers who obtain outstanding results in the assessment and mitigation of natural hazard adopting a multidisciplinary approach. In addition, the NH Division awards the Plinius Medal devoted since 2012 to mid-career researchers and the Soloviev Medal for scientists who give outstanding contributions in fundamental aspects of research on natural hazards.
The 2019 Sergey Soloviev Medal is awarded to Kyoji Sassa for outstanding scientific contributions in fundamental research in landslide hazards and in landslide risk-reduction initiatives for the benefit of societies.
The 2019 Plinius Medal is awarded to Philip J. Ward for outstanding research on flood and drought risk assessments from global to local scales.
The 2019 Division Outstanding Early Career Scientists Award is awarded to Jadranka Šepić for fundamental contributions to the research on meteorological tsunamis and high-frequency sea level oscillations.
The 2018 Sergey Soloviev Medal is awarded to Giuseppe De Natale for his fundamental contributions to the assessment and management of seismic and volcanic hazards and risk.
The 2018 Plinius Medal is awarded to Hannah L. Cloke for her outstanding research on uncertainties in modelling flood hazards and understanding risks in operational ensemble flood forecasting as well as climate impact assessments of future flood risks.
The 2018 Division Outstanding Early Career Scientists Award is awarded to Thomas Wahl for his fundamental contributions to the research on assessment of coastal-flood risk.
The 2018 Outstanding Student Poster and PICO (OSPP) Award is awarded to Benno Wachler Feedbacks of sea-level rise induced topographic changes of the Wadden Sea on tidal dynamics
The 2018 Outstanding Student Poster and PICO (OSPP) Award is awarded to David Bonneau The Use of Terrestrial Laser Scanning for the Characterization of Debris Accumulation Patterns in the White Canyon, British Columbia
The 2018 Outstanding Student Poster and PICO (OSPP) Award is awarded to Emanuele Bevacqua Changing risk of compound flooding over Europe under anthropogenic climate change
The 2018 Outstanding Student Poster and PICO (OSPP) Award is awarded to Marina Peña Gallardo The impacts of drought in agricultural productivity. An analysis at different scales for the two major rain-fed crops in Spain.
The 2018 Outstanding Student Poster and PICO (OSPP) Award is awarded to Veronika Röthlisberger Quantifying exposure: the influence of value estimation schemes
The diffusion of social media such as Facebook, Twitter, etc. in addition to traditional blogging led to a diversification in the impact of science communication. However, as Eryn Brown and Chris Woolston wrote in Nature last January, blogs continue to be effective platforms for disseminating research into the world and increase the discovery of science. This is the reason why we believe our natural hazards blog is fundamental to increase outreach activities of the EGU community with particular attention – …
written by Stefano Alberti and Margherita Cecilia Spreafico Rockfalls, rock slides and rock avalanches in high mountains The terms rockfall, rock avalanche and rockslide are often used interchangeably. Different authors have proposed definitions based on volume thresholds, but the establishment of fixed boundaries can be tricky. Rockfall can be defined as the detachment of a mass of rock from a steep rock-wall, along discontinuities and/or through rock bridge breakage, and its free or bounding downslope movement under the influence of …
Marie Keiding is a researcher in the Geohazard and Earth Observation team at the Geological Survey of Norway. Together with her colleague, John Dehls, who is leading the project, she works to develop and operate the new mapping service called InSAR Norway. Before we start, let’s briefly describe what is InSAR. First, the Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is a day and night operational imaging system that can be operated from satellite aircraft or ground and has high capabilities of penetrating …
#EGU19 program is ready! Are you ready for it? The next EGU’s General Assembly is taking place in one week! We bet you already started planning your program for the week, that Natural Hazard (NH) sessions are included, and, especially if you are an Early Career Scientist (ECS), you have found many sessions and courses targeting your specific needs and interests. What fits more to your interests: Attend talks and posters, learn and improve skills, or take an active role …
Earlier this month, we hosted a record-breaking number of participants (over 16,000) at our annual EGU General Assembly in Vienna. The meeting included over 16,000 poster, oral and PICO presentations in over 650 sessions, as well as a number of popular short courses and side events. We are grateful to all participants, including conveners, the EGU Programme Committee, Copernicus Meetings, conference assistants, exhibitors, and ACV and EGU office staff, for making the meeting a success. If you participated in the meeting, we especially welcome your suggestions and feedback (deadline: 9 June), which will be instrumental in ensuring an even more successful General Assembly next year (3–8 May 2020, Vienna).
Of special highlight at the meeting was a session on ‘Science, Politics and European (dis)integration: A Conversation of Geoscientists with Ilaria Capua and Mario Monti’, which motivated the EGU to issue a declaration supporting a united Europe for the benefit of global scientific research.
In other news this month, the EGU launched a new journal, Geochronology, as well as a science-policy competition for early career scientists (deadline: 15 May). We also ran an extraordinary election, which saw Claudio Zaccone elected as SSS Division President.
Finally, we would like to remind you that we are currently accepting nominations for the 2020 EGU awards and medals, including for the new Angela Croome Award and Katia and Maurice Krafft Award. To promote the best deserving geoscientists from around the world and increase diversity in the group of EGU awardees and medallists, we encourage the EGU membership to consider gender, geographical, and cultural balance when nominating outstanding Earth, planetary and space scientists at various career stages. Please consider submitting a nomination by 15 June.