Susan Cutter is a distinguished professor of geography at the University of South Carolina where she directs the Hazards and Vulnerability Research Institute. Cutter researches what makes people and the places where they live vulnerable to extreme events such as hurricanes or tornadoes, and how vulnerability and resilience are measured, monitored, and assessed. She has…

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Increasing disaster threats not only reflect the onset of events such as earthquakes or floods, but also the changing demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of the population. A large, violent tornado, for instance, passing through an open field presents little danger. On the other hand, a relatively weak tornado can pose significant risks to human life and can result in…

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Mortality remains one of the major outcomes related to natural disasters, and a recent study on which types of disasters are the deadliest has yielded interesting results. University of South Carolina researchers Kevin Borden and Susan Cutter found that, surprisingly, heat or drought to be the deadliest natural hazard during the time period from 1970 to…

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Dec. 26, 2010, will mark the sixth anniversary of the earthquake that spawned a tsunami on the coastlines of countries bordering the Indian Ocean. In collaboration with the Indonesian NGO SurveyMETER, Elizabeth Frankenberg, Duncan Thomas, and colleagues designed a survey to study how the disaster affected villagers living in areas heavily damaged by the tsunami….

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The 2004 hurricane season was the worst in Florida’s history. Four hurricanes caused $45 billion in damages and widespread population displacement. About 1.6 million people evacuated their homes—and many had to more than once in the year. Based on sample surveys with 11,000 residents in heavily hit areas, Stanley Smith has found new results on…

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