Lunch Hour Lecture: Disaster: It’s Not Like a Hollywood Movie

About the lecture: Each year around the world there are more than 600 disasters. Hollywood movies have propagated a popular culture viewpoint that is very different from the real disasters that victims and survivors experience. Hence, there are more than 60 common misconceptions about disaster. Starting from the premise that disasters are more normal than exceptional events, this lecture will explore the gap between perception and reality in order to draw a more objective picture of the phenomenon, as we need to improve our coping capacity. Disaster opens a revealing window on the inner workings of society, but not as Hollywood sees it.

Professor David Alexander PhD FRGS FGS FRSA FICPEM, Institute of Risk and Disaster Reduction at UCL. Professor Alexander teaches emergency planning and management. His books include "Natural Disasters", "Confronting Catastrophe", "Principles of Emergency Planning and Management", "Recovery from Disaster" (with Ian Davis) and "How to Write an Emergency Plan". He is the founding Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, and Vice-President of the Institute of Civil Protection and Emergency Management. His research interests include natural hazards, earthquake disasters and emergency planning and management. He is currently working on a new book on emergency management, a companion to his recent emergency planning volume.