Resilience Enhancement through Multi-Hazard Recovery Analysis of Earthquake and Flood-Affected Infrastructure

The increasing frequency and severity of multi-hazard events necessitate comprehensive frameworks to assess the compounding risks to infrastructure systems. Multi-hazard risks, particularly from independent hazards impacting the same infrastructure and communities simultaneously (or close in time), significantly affect the resilience of urban centers. Recent events, such as the flooding in Türkiye following the 2023 earthquake, demonstrate the compounded impacts on communities and infrastructure. These interactions are understudied despite their severity, particularly concerning infrastructure resilience and recovery. To address this gap, the RE-EnForce project introduces a novel computational framework to quantify multi-hazard risks in interconnected infrastructure systems, focusing on interactions between unrelated hazards that impact the same system. The project will also provide novel risk and resilience metrics for stakeholders, including government agencies, emergency managers, and the reinsurance industry. While adaptable to various infrastructure systems and hazard interactions, RE-EnForce prioritizes models to assess the risk and resilience of reinforced concrete building portfolios and transportation networks, accounting for impacts of earthquakes and floods occurring in the same region and within short timeframes. The key project outcomes include (a) consistent consequence scales to evaluate the functionality of individual RC buildings and building portfolios for hazard interactions, (b) similar scales to assess the functionality of bridges and transportation networks, and (c) a decision-making framework considering the system-level performance of interconnected infrastructure. By addressing the compounded effects of spatial and temporal hazard interactions, RE-EnForce advances multi-hazard risk assessment and offers a holistic approach to disaster risk reduction. It supports risk-informed decisions and aligns with global efforts towards urban resilience.