WEBVTT

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In August 2017,

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Hurricane Harvey devastated communities
across Texas and Louisiana.

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Three and a half feet of rain
fell in just four days.

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A hundred and fifty thousand
houses were flooded.

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Seventeen thousand people
had to be rescued from the flood,

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and more than 36 people died.

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We watched, rapt.

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Our hearts broke
for those who lost everything

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and soared with pride at the sight
of the spontaneous volunteers,

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our Cajun Navy,

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who deputized themselves
and their fishing boats

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to rescue stranded survivors.

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(Applause)

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"Unprecedented," we said.

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"Unforeseen."

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"A terrible act of God."

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"One of the worst
natural disasters in US history."

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But you know what?

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I don't agree.

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Yes, of course,

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what happened in
Hurricane Harvey was horrific,

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but it's the "natural"
in "natural disaster"

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that I take issue with.

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Just like climate change is 100% real
and caused by humans ...

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(Cheers) (Applause)

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so are what we call "natural disasters."

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Yes, of course, wind, rain and hurricanes
are naturally occurring,

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but to call the death and destruction
caused by these events "natural"

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makes their devastation seem inevitable
and out of our control.

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But it is not out of our control.

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(Applause)

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I have been an emergency
manager for 15 years.

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Most of my time was spent
helping communities prepare for disaster.

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But I've also helped them

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respond to and recover from more
than 50 presidentially declared disasters,

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from Katrina to Maria,

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Northern California wildfires
to Colorado floods,

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and countless in between.

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Out of that experience,
I cofounded a company called Geospiza,

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where we use data to help
companies and communities

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understand and mitigate
their disaster risk.

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And across all of that,
all of that experience,

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the key thing I learned

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is that nearly all
of the trauma and tragedy

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we call "natural disaster"

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is not only predictable; it's preventable.

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Disasters are 100%

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a result of poor human decision-making.

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That anybody in this country should die

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or lose everything as a result
of a so-called natural disaster

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should make you angry to your core.

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Incredible advances in mapping,
modeling and atmospheric science

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have given us 7 to 10 days notice
of a hurricane's landfall

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and allowed us to predict,
often to the individual house,

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how much damage we should expect.

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Flood modeling is so robust
that days, days in advance,

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we can predict on what day,
at what time and what locations

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we expect rivers to overtop their banks.

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And even more amazing than our ability
to predict a specific event

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is our knowledge of how
natural hazards affect communities

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and what we can do to prevent the damage.

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To show you what I mean,

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let's take a deeper look
at Houston and Harvey.

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Houston is the largest US city
with no formal zoning.

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And between the late 90s and Harvey,
it was also one of the fastest growing.

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At its peek,

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275 people moved to Houston each day,

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and with all of those people
came the need for housing.

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Houston accommodated

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by paving over more than 30%
of the wetland and prairie,

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and trading naturally absorbent land
for impervious houses, driveways and roads

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has consequences.

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Rain water can't rapidly absorb and stow.

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Instead, it funnels, collects ...

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and floods!

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More than a decade before Harvey,

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a US Army Corps of Engineers' report
mapped locations in Houston

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that would experience
catastrophic flooding

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in significant rain events.

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But developers,
together with city officials,

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willfully disregarded that known risk.

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They traded short-term financial gains

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for the long-term safety
of future residents.

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They explicitly chose to build in areas
they knew would flood,

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and people died!

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The disaster data illuminates
another heartbreaking reality.

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Because disasters are not natural
but a result of human decision-making,

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the same systemic inequities
that exist in our community every day

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are magnified in disaster.

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Disasters do not distribute
their wrath equally.

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Historically marginalized communities
suffer disproportionately.

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Through redlining

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and by placing affordable housing
in high-risk geographies

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like the Lower Ninth Ward,
in New Orleans,

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or the Far Rockaway, in Queens,

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we've created a system where brown,
black, disabled and poor people

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are far more likely to have their lives
and livelihoods washed away.

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And the super rich,
like Kim Kardashian and Kanye West,

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hire private firefighters
to protect their homes,

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while the rest of us depend
on a public firefighting force

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that is 69% volunteers!

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Those Northern California wildfires

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are another example
of our failure to use data.

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Medicare data available
to emergency managers

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identifies people who have
daily in-home healthcare.

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Other data identifies people
who have a hearing impairment.

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Websites show us where
there's spotty cell phone signal,

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and public-facing notification plans
tell us that in an emergency,

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evacuation orders
will be issued by a text message

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and that police will drive
through neighborhoods,

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announcing evacuation
from their bullhorns.

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A simple overlay of all
of these elements tells us

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there are huge numbers of people
for whom these strategies would not work.

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We knew they wouldn't hear the text alert,

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and we knew that even if they could hear
a bullhorn from the street,

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they wouldn't have been able
to get out of their beds independently,

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let alone out of the house,

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and 46 people died who didn't have to!

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We don't yet know
how to be fully disaster-proof,

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of course,

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but we can do a hell of a lot
better than we do today.

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And one of the key ways
is by investing in mitigation.

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Projects like raising
the electrical equipment

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in high-rise buildings or hospitals

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from the basement to upper floors,

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or by clearing brush from around houses,
or installing flame-resistant roofs,

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or even by increasing the drainage
adjacent to roads

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are not sexy.

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It's not sexy at all.

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It's not nearly as sexy as the dramatic
rescues we see on the news,

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but these projects save lives

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and huge amounts of money.

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Sure,

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a project in Reedsburg, Wisconsin,

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to raise telecommunications equipment
just four feet higher

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sounds super boring!

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But that 235-thousand-dollar project

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is going to save $ 2.2 million

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by avoiding losses from flood!

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These are venture-capital-level returns.

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A comprehensive cost-benefit analysis

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by the National Institute
of Building Sciences

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found that for every dollar
we invest in mitigation,

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we save at least six

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in disaster response and recovery costs.

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On some projects, the return is 32 to 1.

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The good news is that some communities
are putting data to work to save lives.

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We think of Portland
as a lush, verdant metropolis.

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It's temperate and green,

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but that beautiful tree canopy
is not equally distributed.

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Neighborhoods in Northeast Portland

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have less than half the tree cover
of other parts of the city,

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and that lack of trees dramatically
increases surface and air temperatures.

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On summer days,

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Northeast Portland can be
more than 20 degrees hotter

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than the rest of the city.

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Even in this theater,

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we can imagine the difference
of a lovely 75 and a sweltering 95.

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And those tree-poor neighborhoods
are also dollar poor,

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and their residents have elevated
asthma and heart disease rates.

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And the evidence is clear

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that heart disease and asthma and poverty

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all increase a person's risk
of dying in a heatwave.

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So on extremely hot days,

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which are now way more common
thanks to climate change,

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residents of Northeast Portland
are going to die disproportionately.

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But Portland is taking action.

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City agencies, together
with community members,

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are planting and nurturing trees.

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Not only are they beautiful;

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they reduce urban heat
and absorb air pollution

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and reduce the risk
of dying from a heatwave.

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It is so simple.

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Nothing about this is rocket science.

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Here's the bottom line:

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calling wildfires, heatwaves, hurricanes
and flood natural disasters

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obfuscates our human responsibility.

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It lets us off the hook
for the death and destruction.

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It might feel awkward for a while,
but let's call them human disasters.

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And let's also stop behaving as if we're
powerless against their consequences.

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What if we treated airplane crashes
the way we treat human disasters?

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What if, when a place crashed,
the FAA said, "What do you want from us?

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We are flying tubes of metal
filled with people through the air!

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We're defying nature, and it's hard ..."?

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(Laughter)

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What if they took the incredibly rich data

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from the black boxes
and the voice recorders,

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and they just put it on the shelf,
and planes just fell out of the sky?

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We would be enraged.

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But this is exactly how we treat
hurricanes, floods,

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wildfires and heatwaves.

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Whole communities are wiped out,

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leaving their residents emotionally
and financially devastated

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and others dead,

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and our leaders literally shrug.

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They say,

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"Mother Nature."

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"Acts of God."

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"We did the best we could."

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No.

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No, you didn't.

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We know how to stop the suffering.

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We have the data!

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We just need to use it

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to create policy
that prioritizes mitigation,

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to stop building houses
in areas we know are dangerous

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and to take protective action
against climate change now -

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(Audience member) Yes!

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Before it's too late.

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(Applause)

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We have the power to save lives,

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and we must use it!

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Thank you.

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(Applause) (Cheers)