RAPID: Assessing Community-Scale Disruption and Restoration of Basic Needs in Post-Earthquake Haiti

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This Grant for Rapid Response Research (RAPID) seeks to understand the relationship between physical damage in disasters and socio-economic disruption at the community-scale. In this study, the community scale refers to neighborhoods or similar spatial units that comprise an urban area. Our central research question is: To what extent can the extent of building damage predict the severity of disruption to the communities social fabric and economic function? Is there a linear relationship between damage rate and disruption? Or are there thresholds of damage beyond which disasters become catastrophes? How does the relationship between damage and disruption change over time in the initial response and restoration periods? Post-earthquake Haiti experienced an extensive range of damage and disruption across the urban landscape, thus providing a rare opportunity to investigate these questions within the context of a single disaster event.Fieldwork will focus on gathering two types of information: 1) damage data to ground-truth available remote satellite information on building damage, and 2) data on socio-economic disruption at the community scale. Gathering the damage data is time-sensitive because the field information must be temporally consistent with the remote sensing images. Gathering the disruption data is time-sensitive because the information will be based on field interviews that seek to elicit judgments and recollections about conditions in the immediate aftermath and first few months of the disaster. These data must be gathered quickly, in order to capture the perishable recollections and situational observations that rapidly fade from memory.This research will be undertaken using three complementary approaches: 1) automated, semi-automated and visually-based analysis of high resolution satellite and aerial remote sensing imagery; 2) acquisition and expert interpretation of street-view GPS referenced photographs and video using the VIEWS field data collection system; and 3) interviews with NGOs involved in community-scale relief, response and recovery within Haiti (supplemented with secondary data). Data collection will focus on 8-12 selected Haitian communities that collectively represent a broad range of earthquake damage severity.The study extends the research teams current work on methods for measuring community disruption and recovery following Hurricanes Charley and Katrina, by testing U.S. methods in the context of Haiti. It also draws on the research teams experience with remote sensing-based damage assessment for the Haiti earthquake (through the GEO-CAN initiative) by extending the nationwide work to the community scale.In addition to the datasets on damage and disruption to be developed, a primary outcome of the research will be analysis of the relationship between damage and disruption over space and time in the Haitian case. We envision that the outputs of this research will take the form of a report documenting our findings about disruption and the restoration of basic needs in the selected Haitian communities. Remote sensing and in-field survey results will also be documented and displayed through online media including the Virtual Disaster Viewer.