The Solomon Islands gold mine contaminated water spill disaster constitutes a perfect case for discussing the concept of failure criteria. Failure criteria is the mirror image of the success criteria. Failures are the events that generate risks studied in risk assessments. Tailings dams are built with the purpose (goal) of storing byproducts of mining operations, i.e. the tailings. Tailings consist of finely ground ore (the mineral) and process effluents generated by mechanical and chemical processes. In fact, those processes goal…
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Estimating Business Interruption Recent media reports on business interruption insurance claims triggered by natural catastrophes have revealed an ubiquitous trend to shortcomings. Business interruption (or BI) insurance policies cover the loss of profit that a business suffers after a disaster (such as the downpours in Quang Ninh, or what Godzilla’ El Nino could create) due to a reduction in turnover and the increased costs in running the business. The loss covered may be due to a disaster-related closing of the business…
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Earthquakes, History and Cognitive/ Behavioral Biases In 1570 AD a major earthquake hit the city of Ferrara tuck in between Florence and Venice in Italy. The seismic swarm destroyed over 40% of the buildings, but caused little harm to inhabitants. I can only imagine how the decision makers (reigning family) of the time were torn for the right course of action in the aftermath of the disaster. Here is my take on the different opinions that could have been expressed,…
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