“The focus of our team was on the perspective of the residents of the earthquake area. To gain insights into their situation, we held several interviews with citizens whose houses were actually damaged as a result of the earthquakes. Hearing their personal – and emotional – stories made it very real. We realised that the earthquakes and especially the aftermath caused them a lot of stress and health problems. The main problem that needed fixing for them, was the complicated damage assessment process.
They’ve gone through frustration due to insufficient, delayed and sometimes lacking compensation for damages to their houses. Moreover, their dissatisfaction and frustration grew as they had a feeling that the government did not trust them. They felt like they were treated as frauds, which in turn led to feelings of distrust towards the government as well.
My team and I focused on remote sensing in order to improve the damage assessment process. By using surface deformation maps and earthquake intensity maps, you can immediately verify whether a person lives in an area that was affected by the earthquakes. This information could then support damage claims and would speed up the process because there is less discussion needed on the causes of damages. This information could then be added to a database, that should be accessible to multiple parties in order to make the collaboration more efficient. The best part is that this can be implemented in a platform that already exists.”
