• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.11 no.10
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• pp.267-273
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• 2011

The purpose of this paper is to suggest the types of recovery activities and the major contents of preimpact recovery plan through theoretical review. Disaster recovery is to provide immediate support during the early recovery period necessary to return vital life support systems to minimum operation levels, and continuing to provide support until the community returns to normal. Disaster researchers distinguished 4 types in recovering from disaster as follows; an emergency period, a restoration period, a reconstruction period, and a developmental reconstruction period. And recovery measures are both short-term and long-term. Short-term measures are relief and rehabilitation and long-term measures include reconstruction. Finally, to design a preimpact recovery plan, we should define a disaster recovery organization that includes major stakeholders, identify the location of temporary housing, determine how to perform essential tasks, address the licensing and monitoring of contractors and retail price controls to ensure victims are not exploited, determine how recovery tasks will be carried out at historical sites, and recognize the recovery period as a unique time to enact policies for hazard mitigation and incorporate this objecive into the recovery planning process.

• Stress
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.105-119
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• 2017

Backgound: The first step in disaster response is preparation, and education and training of workforce are considered as important elements of preparedness. The purpose of this study was to identify the needs of volunteers by exploring service experiences after a disaster to develop volunteer education programs. Methods: Participants were 11 volunteers who had supported the victims' families during about 1 year after the Sewol ferry disaster. Focus group interviews were conducted to investigate the experience of volunteer at the levels of individual, within-team and between-teams, and to discover the need of further training. Results: The results showed that the needs for self- and team-care and advanced education were reported. Conclusions: These results were discussed in terms of development of competence and mental health needs disaster volunteers. Limitations of this study and directions of future research were suggested.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.69-78
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• 2013

Recently, due to the casualties and property damage caused by disasters, it became important to evacuate the victims to a safe place and come up with a space for them to inhabit for a certain period of time. Therefore, this study aims to design and develop a temporary housing system that would quickly provide a safe and comfortable living space until the displaced persons can return to a normal life again when a disaster occurs. As a result, a system of a BIM-based modular housing, a modular town through automatic placement, and a method to calculate the capacity and the total cost was developed. As this system provides the temporary housing facilities and the site in 3D, it can be utilized as a training material on a normal basis, as well as the first case material for rapid decision making when there is a disaster.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.52 no.1
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• pp.25-53
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• 2017

The ultimate goal of this research is to examine the geographical characteristics of therapeutic spaces where have been appeared in Wa-dong and Gojan-dong, Ansan-si after the disaster of the MV Sewol. As looking into the inside, the aim of the therapeutic spaces, which cover each target group (victims) individually, is various and different because the disaster of the MV Sewol generated various direct and indirect victims requiring healing. The therapeutic spaces are estimated at about 10 organizations and are leaded by private agents predominantly. Furthermore, the therapeutic spaces are located near, but are aside from Danwon high school where many students are reported killed and injured in the incident. And the therapeutic spaces provide simple and repetitive diversions, for example, having a meal, knitting and studying, rather than special programs to restore a broken daily life to the original state. On the basis of such a background, the geographical characteristics of the therapeutic spaces related to the disaster of the MV Sewol can be summarized as follows; first, it seems that target groups accept the therapeutic spaces as the concept of place gradually. Even though most of the therapeutic spaces were suggested by third parties at first, target groups are involved in the management and recollection of their own therapeutic spaces as well as the plan for a future direction now; and consider the therapeutic spaces as exclusive properties. Second, the disaster of the MV Sewol have embedded collective trauma to not only direct victims, but extensive groups such as parents, brothers and sisters, relatives, friends and neighbors as noted earlier. Therefore, the therapeutic spaces support comprehensive target groups; but each therapeutic space is not overlapped each other. However, to solve collective trauma in a local community effectively, the therapeutic spaces are networked closely and build a regular cooperative system. Third, a continuous memory is mentioned as an important point to overcome collective trauma, but some phenomena such as fatigue and conflict with neighbors, out-migrants and a faded atmosphere as time passes act as risk factors in Ansan-si. To keep a continuous memory, the therapeutic spaces attempt the recovery of local communities and devise various events, for example, cultural performances; furthermore, are closely connected with external organizations.

• Environmental Analysis Health and Toxicology
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• v.31
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• pp.19.1-19.7
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• 2016

A large portion of the Korean population has been exposed to toxic humidifier disinfectants (HDs), and considering that the majority of the victims are infants, the magnitude of the damage is expected to be considerably larger than what has currently been revealed. The current victims are voicing problems caused by various diseases, including but not limited to lung, upper respiratory tract, cardiovascular, kidney, musculoskeletal, eye, and skin diseases, etc. However, there has been difficulty in gaining validation for these health problems and identifying causal relationships due to lack of evidence proving that toxic HD is the specific causes of extrapulmonary diseases such as allergic rhinitis. Furthermore, the victims and bereaved families of the HD case have not received any support for psychological distress such as post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, feelings of injustice, and anger caused by the trauma. In addition, because the underlying mechanisms of the toxic materials within the HDs such as polyhexamethylene guanidine phosphate, poly(oxyalkylene guanidine) hydrochloride, chloromethylisothiazolinone /methylisothiazolinone have yet to be determined, the demand for information regarding the HD issue is growing. The victims of the HD cases require support that goes beyond financial aid for medical costs and living expenses. There is a desperate need for government-led integrated support centers that provide individualized support through health screenings; in other words, we need an integrated facility that provides the appropriate social support to allow the victims to recover their physical and mental health, so as to well prepare them to return to a normal life. The implementation of such a plan requires not only the close cooperation between those departments already directly involved such as the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Health and Welfare, but also active support on a national scale from pan-governmental consultative bodies.

• Journal of the Society of Disaster Information
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.788-805
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• 2023

Purpose: This study aimed to verify the impact of Habitat for Humanity Korea's disaster risk reduction intervention on the mental health and satisfaction with life among residents of southern Bangladesh who had constantly suffered from disaster stress due to perennial flooding. Method: The target group was 138 residents who were pre-surveyed in August 2020 and post-surveyed in November 2021. The interventions consisted of individual incremental housing, public facilities for evacuation, and disaster response training for capacity development. The data were analysed using paired sample t-tests for pre-post changes and one-way analysis of variance to identify differences between treatment groups. Result: The results showed significant improvements in residents' depression, anxiety, somatisation and satisfaction with life after the intervention, with significant differences in mental health levels between the intervention treatments. Specifically, relatively higher disaster mitigation effects were found for individual infrastructure improvements and employment facilities compared to disaster response drills. Conclusion: These results demonstrate the positive role of Habitat for Humanity Korea's disaster risk reduction interventions on the mental health recovery of disaster victims and suggest practical approaches that can be applied in disaster risk areas.

• Journal of the Society of Disaster Information
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• v.13 no.2
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• pp.173-190
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• 2017

As environmental pollution becomes serious, natural disasters are frequent and damage is increasing. Also, due to population overcrowding, social disasters are frequent, and it is difficult to predict due to the variety of area, extent, and damage. As the disasters have diversified and the scale of the damage has increased, the scale of evacuees and the period of evacuation have diversified. Should be provide facilities that will be protected from second damages to victims who have lost their homes quickly. It supports a prefabricated house, but it is difficult to supply it. In this study, the ultimate goal is to plan an outdoor temporary housing facility that can supply quickly when the capacity of the evacuation facility is insufficient or the evacuation facility is insufficient.

• Journal of the Architectural Institute of Korea Planning & Design
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.3-12
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• 2019

Current risk assessment methods typically determine accident risks embedded in construction projects by combining severity and frequency; however, they do not reflect the characteristics of construction projects. To solve the problem, this study aims to develop a novel risk assessment method that combines severity, frequency, and disaster influence factors (i.e., weather conditions and worker's characteristics) for assessing risks of activities occurring on a construction site actually. In this study, a severity was estimated by death against victims, and a frequency was estimated by the victim rate. The frequency was then converted to probability taking disaster influence factors into account. Thus, instead of considering severity and frequency for assessing the original risks (RO), the proposed method uses severity and probability to yield adjusted risks (RA) for each activity. A case study was conducted to determine if the proposed method works as intended in a real setting. The results show that RA is more sensitive to disaster influence factors than RO and, therefore, is able to assess the actual risks reflecting the working environment and conditions of a construction site. This study contributes to risk management of construction projects by offering a risk assessment method that measures a possibility of potential disasters from the probabilistic perspective. This method would help project managers assess accident risks in a more systematic and quantitative manner.

• Journal of Environmental Health Sciences
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• v.48 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2022

Objectives: The purpose of this study is to reveal the circumstances under which the cases of harm to health caused by humidifier disinfectant were neglected and show the points where the number of victims and the degree of damage could have been reduced. In addition, it attempts to describe how damage management proceeded immediately after the incident and actually exacerbated the damage. Finally, it explores the unfortunate aspects of the recent trial. By doing so, it attempts to take this as an opportunity to consider whether a tragic event such as the humidifier disinfectant incident could occur in the future. Methods: This study collected and analyzed data on chemical material characteristics related to humidifier disinfectants, data on health effect characteristics, data on related laws and regulations from the Ministry of Environment, data related to the damage investigation by the Korea Environmental Industry and Technology Institute, and current contents. Results: The lack of related systems and laws is the area where the greatest responsibility for the cause of the humidifier disinfectant disaster falls, so it is difficult for the government to escape this responsibility. Establishing a dedicated department to identify the prevalence of certain diseases within the functions of the Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service to monitor health can greatly contribute to the prevention and management of diseases through early detection and management of group outbreaks caused by harmful factors. Humidifier disinfectant damage relief should have been expanded earlier beyond HDLI (humidifier disinfectant lung injury) to include non-specific diseases such as asthma, pneumonia, and interstitial pneumonia. The scope of relief benefits should have also been expanded earlier to include the payment of disability benefits. Fortunately, with the 2020 revision of the Special Act, the conditions for estimating causal relations were eased and individual screening systems such as health impact assessment were reorganized along with the introduction of a rapid screening system. Conclusions: The management system for chemical substances in a country is clearly of paramount importance, and the ministry in charge must have a response system in case of damage to health effects. Administration that looks at the victims' situation from their point of view is needed, and technical countermeasures are required to quickly recognize the prevalence of certain diseases.

• Fire Science and Engineering
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.82-89
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• 2014

Disasters that destroy homes and infrastructure and cause significant financial damage are becoming more common as population centers grow. In addition, several natural disasters have resulted in a major loss of life and created countless refugees due to damage to housing. After major catastrophic disasters, it is very important that the government agencies respond to post-disaster housing issues and provide resources such as temporary housing before the full rehabilitation and reconstruction of destroyed and damaged housing. To provide affordable temporary housing for residents who may lose their homes as the result of a catastrophic disaster including storms, government agencies must develop a post-disaster housing prototype. In general, government agencies should explore several different forms of factory-built single-story, single family housing, such as modular homes, panelized homes, and precut homes. In urban cities including New York and Seoul, it is very important to provide housing which supports the demand for higher-density living spaces than single-family homes or trailers typically available due to the high population density and the desire to resettle as many residents as possible in their former neighborhoods. This study identified the urban post-disaster housing prototypes that may provide higher density housing with high quality living spaces, high air quality, and energy efficiency as well as rapid deployment. A case study of "Urban Post-Disaster Housing Prototype Program in New York" was conducted through a detailed interview process with a designer, engineer, contractor, the Office of Emergency Management (OEM) in New York, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), and temporary occupants. An appropriate disaster housing program that can provide living spaces for victims of disasters that keeps residents in their community and allows them to live and work in their neighborhoods was developed.