Confounding Major Disasters in 2019-2020

Explore a comprehensive conference session examining the complex interplay of major disasters that occurred in 2019-2020, including COVID-19, Australian bushfires, locust swarms in East Africa, earthquakes, droughts, and floods. Delve into the challenges of understanding, identifying, assessing, and reducing disaster risks in the face of confounding co-factors, particularly in the context of climate change, land use alterations, and rapid global urbanization. Gain insights from interdisciplinary perspectives covering fundamental science behind anomalous and recurring events, early warning systems, disaster mitigation and adaptation strategies, and cutting-edge technologies for disaster relief. Examine specific topics such as augmenting flood extent monitoring with water depth and impact assessment tools, the physics of viruses and their implications, regional climate feedback exacerbating wildfires in the western United States, crowdsourced data for disaster relief, flash drought early warning paradigms, and long-term radon monitoring in relation to seismic activity in the Gulf of Corinth, Greece.