Training Course on Introduction to Disaster Management and Resilient Infrastructure

Course overview

This course offers skills and knowledge on disaster risk management and adopts a multi-hazard, multi-level, multi-agency and multi-disciplinary approaches for disaster risk reduction and resilient infrastructure. The course incorporates new relevant concepts and topics such as risk-informed development planning, transparency and accountability through case study discussion and field visits.

We will delve into real-world examples and best practices to see how these theoretical concepts come to life in practical situations.

Target participants

• Government Agencies
• Private Sector
• International Organizations
• Non-government Organizations and Civil Society Organizations
• Academia

Course fee

AUD $1000

The course fee covers only the 5-day training course. Expenses for accommodation, meals, and travel to the course venue are not covered.

Course contents

Module 1. Understanding Disasters (Day 1)

• River floods, flash floods
• Fires: bushfires, city fires, structure fires
• Digital visualisation of disasters using Earth Observation data – connection to the visual site
• Coastal and maritime disasters, earthquakes, other disasters

Module 2. Disaster Risk Communication (Day 2)

• Basics of Disaster Risk Communication
• Principles of radio communications
• Emergency/Disaster Information Communications Technologies
• Disaster Intelligence/Informatics; Social Media Enabled Emergency/Disaster Management
• Disaster Informatics, Communication infrastructure
• Communications with the community

Module 3. Resilient Infrastructure (Day 3)

• Network Resilience: concepts; Mitigation and Preparedness: multi-hazard and vulnerability assessment, evaluation of strengthening options, prepositioning of resources
• Response and Recovery: evacuation, diversion management, network restoration & waste management
• Humanitarian Logistics: facility location, resource allocation, inventory & capacity planning for food distribution
• Coastal disaster mitigation, including storm surges

Module 4. Community Resilience and Mental Health (Day 4)

• Introduction to Community Resilience and Mental Health
• Psychosocial interventions for disasters: An overview of current evidence-based approaches
• Supporting children and school communities
• Anticipatory Actions and Community Based Disaster Risk Reduction
• People-Centered Early Warning System

Field visit (Day 5)

The purpose of this field trip is to show the effect of windthrow event and provide insights into forest fire research at FLARE Wildfire Research group at the University of Melbourne. The full-day tour begins with a visit to a windthrow event in the Wombat Forest, followed by a stop at the Creswick campus of the University of Melbourne, the home of forestry in Victoria. The trip concludes with a visit to the Creswick Fire Lab and a demonstration of experimental equipment.

Sites:

Stop 1: Windthrow event. We will visit a site of severe windthrow near the township of Barkstead in the Wombat State Forest. Jon Rofe from the Storm Recovery team at DEECA will give an overview of the major windstorm event in the wombat that happened in 2021 and the government’s response to managing it. Tom Fairman from FLARE will talk about what we know about the severity impacts and impact on forest regeneration and fuel hazard.

Stop 2: Creswick Fire Lab. Fire behaviour and risk research requires experimental quantification of the various fire behaviour phenomena. Not all experimental research can be undertaken in the field for both safety and logistical reasons. During a visit to the Fire Lab at the University of Melbourne's Creswick Campus, you will see various experimental equipment in action, and their utilisation for bushfire research.

Contact person

For more information about the course, you may also contact Alex Babanin, at a.babanin@unimelb.edu.au or Bill Ho at bill@adpc.net.