By Bryce Watson

People can act unpredictably during a disaster. Some will take shelter, some will ignore warnings and some will flee. Studying people's reactions to a natural disaster is Dr. Chris Gregg's mission.

Gregg, an assistant professor of geology in East Tennessee State University's Geosciences Department, hopes that figuring out which responses are appropriate will lower the loss of human life and property when disasters like tsunamis or earthquakes strike.

Gathering this data allows other scientists to devise training programs for people in hazardous areas.

A native of Charleston, Tenn., Gregg found his passion during his undergraduate years.

“As a young geologist at Tennessee Tech University, I was surprised to see the same disasters affect the same places over and over again,” said Gregg. “Why do people live near these disaster areas instead of just moving or avoiding them?”

These questions sparked a lifelong interest in Gregg that led to him completing a Ph.D. in geology and geophysics at the University of Hawaii just before the 2004 tsunami that ravaged countries bordering the Indian Ocean. Since then Gregg has worked in Thailand studying tsunami response, and helped with some of the largest studies conducted on communities in the U.S.

The focus of these studies? How people react to disasters.

“People talk about earthquakes before they ever receive a warning,” said Gregg.

He explained that there are four major kinds of information that affect people's behavior after a disaster occurs: Official warnings, informal warnings from neighbors, natural warnings such as feeling shockwaves, and social cues such as people seeing unusual behavior in others who experience a disaster.

“I try to understand how the relationships between different sources affect people's behavior during a disaster,” said Gregg. To study this further Gregg is planning to take a trip in November to the areas of Tonga, Samoa and American Samoa that were hit by tsunamis in recent weeks.

If the project is approved, Gregg and a team of other scientists will attempt to establish key contacts among local authority figures. This will allow the team to return at a later date to study how people responded and experienced the recent tsunamis.

The goal of these studies is to figure out what sort of education local authority figures need.

“We will assess the present training they need in order to respond,” said Gregg. The hope is that this, combined with disaster-detection technology, will significantly reduce human life and property casualties in these areas.

Technology such as the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Pacific tsunami warning system provides “a wide network of seismometers that can help scientists pinpoint where the earthquake's focal point occurred,” said Gregg. This technology has developed to the point where a warning can be issued within minutes of a potential disaster-causing earthquake, according to Gregg.

Gregg is also interested in introducing these ideas to students from many other disciplines. To give an overview of these issues, Gregg teaches a class on natural disasters and on volcanology.

“We study the physical characteristics of hazards as well as social and psychological influences on people's behavior during a disaster,” said Gregg.

In Gregg's classes, students reenact natural disasters as people who would be involved in them in reality.  Townspeople, local authorities and scientists are included to explore how people communicate.

Gregg opted for this method because it allows for a multi-disciplinary approach for students who were interested in blending geology with their own majors. Many social factors come into play during these scenarios, which give it a different dynamic.

“I think it’s an interesting way to show students how people react during these events,” said Gregg. “There are still opportunities for students across many disciplines to make a real difference in the outcome of these hazards."

Gregg's students have worked in Hawaii on tsunami projects and in Italy with architects to determine better methods of construction for buildings in earthquake and volcano hazard areas.

Gregg explained that during the recent tsunamis near Samoa, even considering the impact of the 2004 tsunami, the warning system sent a message within about 20 minutes but the warning was not broadcast until after the first wave had hit.

The warning system was useful for areas much further away than the Samoas, near the epicenter of the tsunami-causing earthquake.

“There is still a lot of improvement to be done,” Gregg said. “The bottom line is that technology is not the only issue. Citizens need to understand how to react to these problems to decrease the overall damage.”