Dr Ilan Kelman Talk to Year 12 Geographers

Year 12 Geography was visited by Dr Ilan Kelman on Tuesday 11th March. He is a Professor of Disasters and Health at University of London. As an academic in the Department of Risk and Disaster Reduction, he had many stories of his travels linked to his research. This has included often visiting areas after major disaster events. Ilan’s research led him to writing a book called ‘Disaster by Choice’. In our A level curriculum we link tectonic hazards to the Degg’s Model - the idea that a disaster can only exist where hazards and vulnerability interact.

Ilan elaborated on this further, discussing the ways our vulnerability is what makes a geophysical event disastrous, providing examples from around the world, including Ecuador, Japan and New Zealand. There were some excellent questions asked from the class, with Adam in particular asking an excellent question that generated a lot of discussion about policy.

His final statement was this:

Disasters are not natural.

Disasters happen slowly.

Disasters are processes, not events.

Ilan was an excellent speaker and we are so thankful he could spend time with us - the experience is such valuable learning and a taster of what a university lecture is like.