Dear James,

Re-insurances like Munich-Re or Swiss-Re do provide reliable natural hazard statistics. They have an interest in collecting this data as complete as possibel. But public available data may be limited because this is sensitive data. Also look for the International Disaster Database (EM-DAT) which may give you some valuable information.

Cheers, Daniel

Thanks Daniel for your answer. I have compiled a list based on inputs from my Professors and my own search. It may not be a complete list by any means nevertheless it is exhaustive and quite reliable. Any authentic addition to this list is invited.

1. http://www.cred.be/

   Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED)

2. http://www.desinventar.org/

   DesInventar

3. http://www.gripweb.org/gripweb/

   Global Risk Information Platform

4. http://www.preventionweb.net/english/professional/statistics/

5. http://preview.grid.unep.ch/

   Global Risk Data Platform

6. http://www.emdat.be/

   The International Disaster Database (CRED Network)

7. http://www.unisdr.org/we/inform/disaster-statistics

   The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction

8. http://www.unoosa.org/

   United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs

Hi James. I never did an exhaustive research on this but I can add two more links which may be interesting. I'm not sure what they provide in detail but I found them in my link-list.

http://reliefweb.int/ and

http://www.gripweb.org/gripweb/

and as I said, re-insurances are intersting but limited in providing access to the data. Check these links for Munich-Re and Swiss-Re:

http://www.munichre.com/en/reinsurance/business/non-life/natcatservice/index.html

http://www.swissre.com/clients/client_tools/about_catnet.html

Thanks Daniel once again for the links. They are quite helpful.

There are no reliable data about disasters, as all sources have both (avoidable and unavoidable) technical problems, scope, and not least self interest in manipulating the information (political, financial or otherwise). In addition, you have serious problem of aggregation across events, countries and over time when, especially but not only, using panel data. As long as you are aware of these deep failures, you can entertain some loose thought experiments. But my recommendation would be that you should be extremely careful from reading, let alone interpreting, too much from available data. Have a look at my 2013 book (Routledge) “Disasters and the Networked Economy” (especially Chapter 1: The Problem with Quantitative Studies).

When I framed this question I was fully aware of the unreliability in dealing with any kind of disaster statistics, whether it came from a governmental, NGO, re-insurance company or International source like UN networks because of obvious reasons which you have quite explicitly pointed out in your book, "Disasters and the Networked Economy. A Book Summary ". Summary of Chp1 (The Problem with Quantitative Studies) reaffirms this fact. I am grateful to you for indicating these gaps in disaster statistics and the inaccuracies associated with them. Thanks Dr. Jose for bringing out your book here. It really adds a new perspective. I would be happy to reference it in my future research work.

A research is as good as the data itself. But it would be a pity to abandon a disaster research just based on incomplete data. Sometimes, available data are the only  source of planning impending hazard mitigation and disaster preparedness scenarios. As we know that the more we dig into historical archives the more cloudy the data begins to appear but that wouldn't mean we should ignore the information all together. By all means they are priceless accounts for reconstructing the past and for setting up a sound foundation for post-disaster studies. In the past many researchers have craved to find historical data for remote locations but without any luck; unlike the recent times where we are flooded with data wherein quality matters more than quantity. It is clear that finding a needle in a haystack would be nerve-racking until we find viable solutions somewhere.

I was told by a colleague that the Dartmouth Flood Observatory has the best database when looking at floods.  http://www.dartmouth.edu/~floods/Dataaccess.htm

This page provides reliable statistics on natural disasters

http://www.emdat.be/

Hope it helps

For country like India, The Indian meteorological Department has excellent data on disasters such as Drought, Cyclone and earthquake. The Central water Commission maintans a long term (over 120 years) record of all floods zonewise. If your requirement is for carrying out research, it will be better to collect these data yourself and analyse because companies like insurance, agriculture only look at the data from their limited point of view.

Thanks Char for mentioning Dartmouth Flood Observatory (DFO). I have been following the updates regularly of Prof. Robert Brakenridge and his team for quite some time now in the campus of University of Colorado at Boulder, USA who have been doing excellent work of monitoring floods worldwide since 1985.

Raquel, I've already listed the emdat link. Thanks for it anyway.

Professor Balakrishnan, you have a valid point. We are very fortunate to have more than 120 years of historical records on disasters. Thanks to the technical legacy left behind by the erstwhile British East India Company. I will directly contact the source (India Meteorological Department) if my research area falls in India instead of going through intermediary channels. In the past I have had contacts with them when I was analysing cyclone data from 1891 to 2012 and again while I paid a visit to their Seismology & Weather Forecasting Departments. I was particularly impressed by the fact that they have meticulously recorded each and every event since the late 19th century without a single year gap. Remarkable!

DEar James

Just a wild thought. May you try for GIS cloud. You may develop a plan/questionnire and send to various users or tag in social media or put the net.

I am unable to visualise the complexities of this.

Kind REgards

Rajiv

As written in my Book summary (Disasters and the Networked Economy, posted here in ResearchGate: "In the case of disaster studies, which normally attempt to analyse economic effects of disasters, the quality of data is poor, mostly based on EM-DAT and some re-insurance companies. Primary source data comes from countries' own collection, which are then collated by the institutions above. Definitions, focus, accuracy and consistency vary within and across sources and are problematic in themselves. So implicit and explicit smoothing assumptions for tractability are strong as a matter of fact".

Dear James,

I attach he sends some links:

http://virtualtechnology.blogspot.com

http://desenredando.org

La vulnerabilidad ha devenido en los últimos tiempos en un tema emergente ante los análisis de los disímiles problemas sociales que se analizan. La vulnerabilidad se muestra como un concepto múltiple en cuanto a su determinación y de imposible cálculo estricto, solución técnica inapelable o verdad absoluta en el diagnóstico. Se refiere a una situación aproximada, media de contextos territoriales locales. No posee un valor absoluto sino que dependerá de los tipos y valores de amenaza existentes, de la escala de estudio, de la profundidad y orientación metodológica del mismo (http://vulnerabilidades.com).

Other key words for search:

DESINVENTAR

SICRET

A big cuban hug

NOAA is a wonderful source. I used hurricanecity.com data because I work around the Caribbean and Atlantic region. Finally, there is the International Disaster Database. None of these are thorough and they may be the best we have for now until a global clearinghouse is developed. I would also recommend reliefweb.com

I think that EM-DAT (http://www.emdat.be/) is a very good source. Depending on the purpose other sources can supplement this information, e.g. when you are interested in a particular country or require more background information the ReliefWeb (http://reliefweb.int/) is also a very good source. It collects information from various sources including official government figures... If you are interested particular in Pacific Islands and disasters there you might also find the Pacific Disaster Net useful (http://www.pacificdisaster.net/pdn2008/). There might be similar portals for other regions int he world.

I belives that EM-DAT (http://www.emdat.be/) is a very good source. and at the same time you can get data from country specific departmental websites.

Dear James, The results depend on the country that is necessary to analyze (the informations are different). The analysis also depends on the type of dangers or hazards: hurricanes, droughts, floods, earthquakes, tsunamis, etc. Actually, this winning importance the search of information in historical documents to reconstruct extreme events of the past. I believe that with these results it is also won in knowledge about the natural risks (past, present and future). Best regards, Felipe