ThinkHazard!: Open source tool for diaster risk management

ThinkHazard! is a new, open source resource pioneered by the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR), capable of analyzing national and local hazard data. It is available for all 196 countries across 8 different natural hazards.

The methodology report communicates:

• The methods used to communicate technical hazard data as simpler hazard levels (section 2);
• The strategy for communicating multiple hazard levels (section 3);
• The management guidance or ‘next steps’ after identifying the hazard level (section 4);
• Other tool features (section 5);
• Software architecture and workflow (section 6);
• The role of the tool administrator (section 7); and
• The classification method used for each hazard (section 0).

Key features of the tool include:

• Users of ThinkHazard! can quickly and robustly assess the level of river flood, earthquake, drought, cyclone, coastal flood, tsunami, volcano, and landslide hazard within their project area to assist with project planning and design;
• ThinkHazard! employs a simple flagging system to highlight the hazards present in a project area, whereby a user is only required to enter their project location – national, provincial or district name;
• The results interface shows a user whether they require high, medium or low awareness of each hazard when planning their project; and
• ThinkHazard! provides recommendations and guidance on how to reduce the risk from each hazard within the project area, as well as links to additional resources such as country risk assessments, best practice guidance, additional websites.