In May, a friend sent me the email below, appearing after the glossary that I have included, and has given me permission to post it.  This is a good example of individuals applying their local knowledge (of the environment and of people's behaviour) to engage in "disaster risk reduction" through on-the-ground forcing of others to act in such a way that stops a normal environmental event from becoming a disaster.

Ilan
http://www.ilankelman.org

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Glossary:

-95-S and 95-N:  Interstate 95, heading south and north respectively.  Interstates are USA highways / motorways, in this case being two lanes in each direction with the directions separated by a width of grass.
-HH:  Hilton Head, a Barrier Island in South Carolina, the east coast of the USA.
-SE VA:  southeast Virginia.
-IR:  infra-red
-Richmond:  A city in Virginia.
-RHL:  Right-hand lane.
-LHL:  Left-hand lane.

Email:

I grew a deeper appreciation for Mother Nature and truckers on my way back from HH. I left on Sunday morning and, as I'm sure you've noticed in the news, SE VA has been the site of a few tornadoes in the past week...I had looked at the IR satellite (or was it Doppler radar?) real-time data and the storm "should" have moved eastward and off the coast by the time I arrived in Richmond later that afternoon. I even delayed the trip by 2 hours to give the storm a head start (and I thought I was being gracious!). Storms hardly ever listen.

I reached Stony Creek, a town about 65 miles S, SW of Richmond and the downpour was so heavy it was virtually impossible to see. Thankfully it was still light outside though it was approaching dusk. Idiots were passing in the left hand lane and most people were moving at an almost-standstill with hazard lights on in the RHL. About this time, 2 truckers decided to enact their own version of traffic control and one pulled into the LHL and the other in the RHL and they moved in parallel at about 25 mph. Of course, some drivers were angry. When the rain relented a little and the 2 trucks parted, a serious accident was visible on 95-S--a 16 wheeler was jackknifed across both lanes and moving toward the lanes of 95-N. Several cars were piled up on either side.

At this point, I looked up into the thick muddy clouds of the storm and decided against continuing NE into the storm and instead to stay the night in a hotel.  Perhaps next time I'll delay my travels until the storm is gone from the IR satellite/radar.
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