Salford secures £1.2m for disaster management research
Tuesday 28 March 2017
THE UNIVERSITY of Salford has won a £1.2million research grant to use digital technology to counter the impact of natural disasters, like floods, earthquakes and droughts.
The grant from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) is the largest secured by the University in the current academic year and underlines the global reach and impact of Salford research.
It also seals a major partnership involving the UK Cabinet Office, 100 Resilient Cities (Rockefeller Foundation), the Environment Agency, Satellite Applications Catapult Ltd, Secure IA Ltd, Telespazio Vega Ltd and the Asian Disaster Prepardness Center and builds on the work of THINKLab in creating collaborative virtual environments for industry and government and the work of the Centre for Disaster Resilience.
The project will focus on South Asia, which recorded 52 disasters and 14,647 deaths in 2015 – 64% of global fatalities - and it will address three global challenges as defined by the United Nations, namely, leadership, urban resilience and adaptation of space and emerging technologies.
Satellite mapping
The research team from the School of the Built Environment will be led by Professor Terrence Fernando with Dr Chaminda Pathirage and Dr Udayangani Kulatunga.
Professor Fernando, Director of THINKLab and an expert in digital visualisations, said: “I hope this project will help us to establish an ambitious interdisciplinary research programme around digital technologies for building resilient communities and smart cities.”
With steering committees globally, and on the ground in Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Pakistan, the team will implement a novel 3D collaborative environment that allows remote teams to get an accurate picture of a disaster event through near real-time 3D satellite data and analytics.
Additionally, the project will test collaborative risk assessment by way of a digital platform which can map vulnerabilities and share information and decision-making around vulnerabilities – physical or man-made, which contribute to the severity of a disaster.
Awareness of risks
Professor Fernando adds: “It is important to give the agencies involved in disaster management a full picture of the characteristics of the local area and the local risks, demographics, ethnic and social factors, infrastructure and the like.
“Our work will help agencies to shift from a response-recovery approach to a risk sensitive development approach and make better decisions about prevention measures to protect communities and infrastructure.”
This project will develop and test the technologies with partners on the ground, Universities of Colombo and Moratuwa (Sri Lanka), Universiti Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia and University of Peshawar (Pakistan) and government agencies who are involved in disaster management.
Industry collaboration
Deputy Vice-Chancellor Professor Richard Stephenson, said: “This is another great example of innovative research at the University of Salford which will impact at a global level and potentially safeguarding lives.
“My congratulations to Professor Fernando and his team who have secured not only a prestigious grant from the EPSRC but will be forging relationships with some key partners in government and industry in line with the University’s strategy for Industry Collaboration Zones.”
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