Course Description
Earth is a dangerous place and risk is an inherent feature of life on this planet. Some of the events and processes that we call 'hazardous,' such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, floods, tsunamis, cyclones and forest fires are natural environmental processes. We define them as hazards only when they pose a threat to human interests. In this course we will examine natural hazards as well as some technological hazards — their causes, their potential impacts on people, and their management and mitigation.
Distribution Requirement: Social Science, Science
Lecture hours: 24
Practicum hours: 12
Exclusion: GGR378H5 or ERS317H5
Prerequisite: 9.0 credit
Recommended Preparation: ENV100Y5 and ERS103H5 and ERS120H5 and GGR112H5
Core Skills Developed
- understanding and articulating the scientific causes and consequences of a variety of natural hazards
- locating quantitative information about hazardous events using global databases
- identifying, summarizing and critically analyzing qualitative and quantitative data from scholarly sources
- communicating research results in a scholarly term paper format
- using basic mapping software