The Cure for Catastrophe

June 13, 2016
Muir-Wood, chief research officer at Risk Management Solutions, exhaustively chronicles modern history’s natural disasters and humankind’s evolving—if erratic—responses to them. Catastrophes such as the 1755 Lisbon earthquake were once interpreted as “acts of fate,” but centuries of meteorological, engineering, and economic research have ushered in “the modern social understanding of disasters and the practical scientific approach to disaster risk reduction.” Recent decades have seen significant post-disaster advancements in the fields of architecture, insurance, forecasting, and probabilistic “catastrophe modeling.” But Muir-Wood contends that there remain enormous impediments to managing natural disasters: namely, the rise in these events as a result of climate change, the increasingly devastating consequences in a world where “the number of people and buildings in harm’s way keeps rising,” and the prevalence of human denial and bureaucratic negligence. In his meticulous reportage on a number of environmental calamities over the past 300 years, the author offers a cautionary map of the route we took to arrive at this vital geologic moment. The path forward should entail “both disaster policy and disaster culture,” Muir-Wood argues: a governing body and a motivated global community that will collaboratively and inventively undertake the management of inevitable catastrophes. Agent: Alex Christofi, Conville & Walsh.

Starred review from July 15, 2016
A fascinating examination of the "forensics of disasters."Common sense teaches that advancing technology will reduce harm from hurricanes, floods, tsunamis, earthquakes, and fires, but the opposite is happening, writes Muir-Wood (Earthquakes and Volcanoes, 1987, etc.), founding editor of Terra Nova and chief research officer of Risk Management Solutions, in this sensible polemic that warns that matters will continue to deteriorate unless big changes happen. "Disasters are determined by what we build, where we choose to live, how we prepare, and how we communicate warnings," writes the author, who ably explores the history of disasters and their many commonalities. For centuries, the oldest natural disaster, fire, dwarfed all others, especially in cities. Brick and stone don't burn, but wood is much cheaper, so vast city fires occurred regularly. Then, after 1900, they vanished with the development of low-cost concrete poured around a metal skeleton. Adding sophisticated engineering protects against earthquakes. However, there is always a trade-off. People often build to resist common catastrophes and pray the others stay away. Cheap concrete structures in Haiti resisted hurricanes but not the rare earthquake. Governments pass building codes--only helpful if strictly enforced, which is not always the case--and offer heavily subsidized insurance, a dreadful policy that encourages people to live in hazardous areas. A simple disaster preventive is to make property owners pay the true cost of insurance. In a rare bipartisan action, the 2012 Congress did just that. Premiums skyrocketed, voters in flood plains and exposed beaches expressed outrage, and Congress quickly reversed itself. Readers will find it hard to stop reading this excellent book and will share the author's perhaps futile yearning that elected officials have the courage to pass inconvenient laws and spend the electorate's money to prevent disasters.

COPYRIGHT(2016) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

July 1, 2016

In an era when natural disasters seem to be worsening, there may be solutions to rising death tolls and growing refugee populations. In this astute work, Muir-Wood (chief research officer, Risk Management Solutions; The Dark Side of the Earth) proposes that if we change certain habits, such as using building materials that are ill-suited for places with frequent catastrophes, we might prevent the very tragedies we claim destroy lives. The author examines how this history of human folly spawned disaster and catastrophe insurance and disaster journalism, which in turn led to some well-known, if controversial, concepts, such as the Richter Scale. He also shows how when forced to produce answers (for instance, if unable or unwilling to leave disaster-prone areas), humans have come up with ingenious ways to ride out or escape the storms. When facing future events, if we learn from the past, more lives might be saved. VERDICT Readers interested in natural disasters, climate change, and weather will be riveted by this comprehensive account of emergency management.--Venessa Hughes, Buffalo, NY

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.