A human damage prediction method for tsunami disasters incorporating evacuation activities

This study presents a tsunami human damage prediction method employing numerical calculation and GIS (Geographical Information System) for Usa town, Tosa City, Shikoku Island, Japan. Sometime near the end of the first half of the twenty-first century, a huge earthquake is predicted to occur along the Nankai trough and costal areas facing the Pacific ocean of Shikoku Island. Much damage due to the resultant tsunamis will be caused, therefore, it is necessary to predict the extent of human damage for every town in high-risk areas. The number of tsunami victims was estimated by population in areas of maximum inundation. The number of deaths as a result of tsunami was estimated by a method which employed accumulated death toll of every area in terms of time and space, taking into account consideration of time necessary to begin to seek refuge after an earthquake, tsunami inundation depth on land, flow velocity and evacuation speed. As a result of this study a rapid decrease in death toll by early evacuation was shown quantitatively for the first time. Thus, with the method presented here, it is possible to estimate the extent of tsunami human damage on coastal regions, and may be useful as a tsunami human damage countermeasure.