Resilience to High Impact Low Occurrence (HILO) disasters: A cross-sector comparison

The Workshop on 'Resilience to High Impact Low Occurrence (HILO) disasters: A cross-sector comparison' is organized by the National Academy of Sciences Sri Lanka (NASSL), with the support of the InterAcademy Partnership and the Association of Academies and Societies of Sciences in Asia (AASSA), as well as six other science academies from the AASSA region.

This timely event acknowledges the 20 years that have passed since the Indian Ocean tsunami that killed more than 200,000 people and provoked huge economic damages; and it is taking place almost five years since the first cases of what we now call COVID-19 were being identified in Wuhan, China, and that of course led to a global pandemic, with updated figures telling us that more than 7 million people died.

Conference Schedule

Thursday 5 September
6pm-8pm: Inauguration, Welcome and Guest addresses
President, NASSL – Professor Ajit Abeysekera
President, NASSL – Professor Nuri Yurdusev (to be confirmed)
Coordinator, IAP – Dr Peter McGrath (pre-recorded)
Director-General, Disaster Management Centre (to be confirmed)
Keynote speech by Professor Sonali Deraniyagala on Economic Impacts of High Impact Low Occurrence (HILO) disasters Preview of cross-sector analysis, on behalf of NASSL – Prof Udayangani Kulatunge
(Dinner)

Friday 6 September
9am-12:30pm
Keynote addresses by Dr Senaka Basnayake on Disaster Management and Mitigation in Asia
Professor Udayangani Kulatunge on Cross sector comparison of HILO disasters based on country reports
Professor Dilanthi Amaratunge on Comparison between Natural HILO hazard (Tsunami) and Biological HILO hazard (Covid)
(Lunch)
1:30pm- 4:30pm
Country presentations on HILO disasters:
2004 Indian Ocean tsunami in Sri Lanka
2011 Tohoku earthquake, tsunami; plus Fukushima disaster in Japan
2013 Kedarnath Glacier Lake Outburst Flood in India
Covid 19 pandemic in Nepal, Covid 19 from Indonesian perspective
Rohingya refugees influx into Cox's Bazaar in Bangladesh

Saturday 7 September
9am-12:30 pm
Structured participant feedback on cross-sector comparison
Panel discussion by country experts
(Lunch)

Read and download the event announcement here.