Climate & Environment

    Extreme Weather Events

Joint Research Initiative

Australia

Modeling the multi-hazard vulnerability of structures to tropical cyclones

Each year, tropical cyclones cause approximately 10,000 deaths and billions of dollars of damage to buildings and infrastructure1. Since the development of natural disaster loss models in the late 20th century, engineering researchers, actuaries, and insurance or disaster risk assessment experts have sought to develop statistical models to quantify the vulnerability of structures and communities to these events. Their multi-hazard nature makes them a complex challenge, especially when it comes to structures in coastal areas, where large storm surges or river flooding can significantly increase damage.
Of the many climate hazard vulnerability models that exist for buildings, few take into account the interrelated or correlated stresses and resulting damage of tropical cyclones. As a result, estimates of damage and loss from these events are often inaccurate. In addition to this difficulty, the scope of these models is limited to residential housing in the United States, and is not applicable to other structures.

Dr. Matthew Mason of the University of Queensland, Australia, will work closely with the AXA Group's risk management team to improve the ability to model tropical cyclone vulnerability. To do this, they will develop correlation functions to couple models to a single pre-existing vulnerability factor (e.g., wind or flooding) to accurately estimate tropical cyclone losses to commercial and industrial infrastructure worldwide. These correlations will be developed for various building typologies that are located in cyclone-prone regions of the world, using an approach that combines empirical analysis of loss data with theoretical structural engineering calculations.

Published on 05/27/2021

Matthew
MASON

Institution

The University of Queensland

Country

Australia

Nationality

Australian

ORCID Open Researcher and Contributor ID, a unique and persistent identifier to researchers

Related articles

Climate & Environment

Extreme Weather Events

Climate Change

Artificial Intelligence

AXA Award

Spain

Reducing Climate Variability Uncertainties to Improve Climate Adaptation Strategies

Watch the video and read his interview below: Why is the study of climate variability so important, and what are... Read more

Markus
DONAT

Barcelona Supercomputing Center

Climate & Environment

Extreme Weather Events

Marine Biodiversity

Climate Change

AXA Chair

United States

Building Resilience to Coastal Hazards with Natural Defenses

The results that Professor Michael Beck, from the University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC), has already achieved in this groundbreaking... Read more

Michael
BECK

University of California - Santa Cruz

Climate & Environment

Terresterial Biodiversity

Marine Biodiversity

Extreme Weather Events

Post-Doctoral Fellowship

United Kingdom

Climate change mitigation: scaling up mangrove protection in the Philippines

Much like coral reefs, mangroves are extremely rich and productive ecosystems that contribute countless services enhancing human well-being. Besides being... Read more

Clare
DUNCAN

University of Exeter