Title: An information management system for the emergency management of hurricane disasters

Authors: Eleftherios Iakovou, Christos Douligeris

Addresses: Department of Industrial Engineering, University of Miami, P.O. Box 248294, Coral Gables, FL 33124, USA. Department of Informatics, University of Piraeus, 80 Karaoli and Dimitriou Street, 18534 Piraeus, Greece

Abstract: Access to accurate and comprehensive information for a wide spectrum of topics to support hurricane disaster planning and response is of critical importance to emergency managers. This paper presents the development of IMASH, an Information Management System for Hurricane disasters. IMASH is an intelligent integrated dynamic information management tool, capable of providing comprehensive data pertaining to emergency planning and response for hurricane disasters. The architecture of IMASH along with all its modules is presented in this paper. IMASH is based on an object-oriented database containing geographically referenced environmental and related data. It further employs the intelligence of a decision support system, while providing worldwide access through the internet and the World Wide Web. The developed system can offer support for a wide range of hurricane disaster related activities hurricane preparedness activities, activities during or just before a hurricane strikes and post-disaster response and restoration activities; it can further serve as a platform that could dynamically be augmented to include new data and models.

Keywords: contingency planning and response; emergency response management; hurricane disasters; information management systems; decision support systems.

DOI: 10.1504/IJRAM.2001.001508

International Journal of Risk Assessment and Management, 2001 Vol.2 No.3/4, pp.243-262

Published online: 04 Jul 2003 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article