Tourism destinations all over the globe face the certainty of experiencing a disaster at some time. Despite this, few destinations have properly developed disaster management plans to help them cope with such eventualities. One reason for this is the limited amount of systematic research carried out in the field. This problem was addressed by drawing on the disaster management literature, combined with a more specific examination of tourism disaster strategies. Presented here are prerequisites and ingredients of effective planning towards producing a framework for analyzing and developing tourism disaster management strategies.

Coordinated, Team Approach: Given the range of private and public sector organizations directly and indirectly involved in the delivery of services to tourists, the development and implementation of a tourism disaster strategy requires a coordinated approach, with a designated management team established to ensure that this happens. The team needs to work in conjunction with other public sector planning agencies and emergency services providers to ensure that the tourism industry's action plan dovetails with those of other parties.

Consultation: To achieve maximum cohesion, both within the tourism sector and between it and the community, disaster planning should be based on a consultative process that is integrated with other areas of strategic planning (e.g., tourism marketing strategies, urban planning and broader regional economic plans). Apart from the bearing other plans might have on the exposure of the tourism sector to risk, and the measures that might be implemented in the response to a disaster, the individuals directly involved change over time and this effects the "chemistry" of the coordination process.

Commitment: No matter how thoroughly and skillfully disaster management plans may be developed, and regardless of the level of consultation in the process, it will be of limited value if the parties involved are not committed to it and all individuals who take action are not aware of it. As highlighted below, the plan must therefore contain clearly articulated protocols regarding the activation of the strategy, and communication and education programs, aimed at ensuring that everyone understands what is expected of them. Ingredients of the tourism disaster management planning process and its outcomes should include:

Risk Assessment: An assessment of potential disaster situations and their relative occurrence probability is an essential first step. This should involve an historical analysis of natural disasters in the region, along with a scanning of the current and emerging environment and alternative scenarios.

Prioritization: A cascaded strategic priority profile (CSPP) needs to be prepared, with a ranking of tasks and activities to be undertaken in response to high risk events identified in the previous step. This also involves the prioritization of actions and the articulation of these across organizations so that a coordinated response can be developed. It must be recognized that tourists are vulnerable in unfamiliar surroundings and their safety must be prioritized.

Protocols: A clearly enunciated set of protocols to ensure that the activities of emergency agencies, tourism authorities and operators are properly coordinated needs to be established and accepted by all parties.

Community Capabilities Audit: An assessment of community capacity to cope with specific disasters needs to be carried out so that the appropriate level of emergency relief from external sources can be determined. This should involve an inventory of the relevant physical, financial and organizational resources of the community.

Disaster Management Command Center: A properly resourced disaster management command center, as the focal point for the disaster management team's operations, is essential. The location and procedures for setting up this facility must be specified in the plan.

Media and Monitoring Activities: A media communication strategy, with early establishment of a centralized source, is necessary to ensure that misleading and contradictory information is not disseminated, and to support response coordination. The media often plays a central role in tourism disaster situations, both in terms of providing important information to tourists during the emergency and in the recovery stage when other sectors of the industry and the consuming public need to be informed about the restoration of services. Systems for monitoring disaster impact, and providing reliable information on safety and the status of tourism services, are therefore needed.

Warning Systems: Once a disaster strategy is in place, the conditions necessary to activate it must be specified, along with the types of hazard for which it is designed. Systems for communicating warnings are also important.

Flexibility: Certain elements of disaster strategies are applicable to all types of emergencies. However, the exposure of some destinations to certain disasters is greater than others; these must be identified so that responses to specific impacts and requirements of high-risk events can be planned. Some flexibility is also important, as the sequence of necessary actions may vary between different types of emergency. Flexibility is also required because it may be necessary for some organizations to perform functions they do not normally carry out.

Involvement, Education and Review: The effectiveness of disaster response and recovery plans will be limited unless those who are required to implement them are directly involved in their development. Organizations and communities need to be informed about the strategy, which should be periodically reviewed in light of reactions to it and new developments. Disaster strategies therefore need to be continuously updated and refined to ensure that new information and organizational changes are taken into account. In particular, post-disaster debriefings are important so that lessons can be learned from experience.

Prof Bill Faulkner is Deputy CEO and Director of Research at Cooperation and Research Centre for Sustainable Tourism, Australia. This article was adapted from its original version, "Towards a Framework for Tourism Disaster Management", in Tourism Management 22(2), pp 135-147, 2001. It is reproduced with kind permission from Elservier Science.
Prof Bill Faulkner can be contacted at B.Faulkner@mailbox.gu.edu.au

Three studies of tourist evacuation behavior have been completed (Drabek, 1994, 1996, 1999): 1) 185 tourist business managers were interviewed about their approaches to disaster preparedness and experiences following major disasters; 2) 520 tourists and 83 business travelers were interviewed after visiting areas impacted by Hurricanes Andrew (Florida) and Iniki (Hawaii) and the Northridge earthquake (California); 3) 406 employees of 118 firms were interviewed following Hurricane Fran (North Carolina) and floods in California, Nevada and Colorado.

Key Lessons

When tourists evacuate before or after a disaster, there are both behavioral similarities and dissimilarities to patterns documented for residential populations. For example, threat denial is the prevailing initial response for both populations. Warning sources differ significantly, however, with tourists often reporting receipt of threat information from lodging staff, other tourists and employees of nearby businesses. Frequently these sources neutralize emergent threat perceptions resulting in delay and argument.

Many tourists take refuge in public shelters and report various sources of dissatisfaction. Most frequently noted were: 1) feared shelter was unsafe, 2) inadequacies with facility (e.g., plugged toilets), 3) excessive crowding, 4) staff-related social factors (e.g., poor management), 5) food inadequacies, 6) peer-related social factors (e.g., unruly children), 7) threat information not available, and 8) shelter location (e.g., hard to find). Conversely, many described their satisfaction with their shelter experience in terms that paralleled these same themes.

There is a substantial gap in the expectations of customers and managers regarding emergency preparedness. For example, consider this questionnaire item: "Despite some public relations efforts, I suspect that managers of most business firms have little or no commitment to disaster evacuation planning." Most managers disagreed (63 percent) whereas one-half of the tourists and business travelers agreed.

Inadequate disaster preparedness results in higher levels of employee dissatisfaction. Acute tensions between work and family priorities were described by one-third of the 406 employees interviewed. Three-fourths, however, said that business managers should give more consideration to potential tensions between work and family in their evacuation plans. Of special importance to thirty percent was that they were not paid during the evacuation time. Failure to provide leadership on these and other issues contributed to judgments of dissatisfaction which lingered long after recovery.

Recommendations

Customer Perspectives. Tourist business managers should: 1) be proactive with warnings, 2) keep customers informed with updates, 3) have a disaster plan, 4) have a hazard brochure and disaster evacuation plans in the room, 5) be available so guests know who's in charge, 6) train staff, 7) be prepared to help guests find emergency shelter, 8) recognize that tourists are not familiar with either the area or the threat, and 9) be prepared to provide food and other emergency supplies.

Employee Perspectives. Tourist business managers should: 1) communicate better, 2) close sooner, 3) provide employee assistance when needed, 4) do more preparedness, 5) have more staff to implement protective actions, 6) establish return procedures, and 7) provide pay for employee time-off during disaster-induced evacuations.

Conclusion

The catastrophic vulnerability represented by the tourism industry requires a significant new investment in disaster preparedness and training. It should be available within existing university-based management curricula and through specialized seminars for those already in the workforce. Relevant faculty, administrators and consultants should implement the content of the recently prepared Instructor Guide made available through the Higher Education Program initiated by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Drabek and Gee, 2000) (available free at: http://www.fema.gov/EMI/edu/higher.htm.

Publications Cited

Drabek, T E 1994 Disaster Evacuation and the Tourist Industry, Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado Boulder. Drabek, T E 1996 Disaster Evacuation Behavior: Tourists and Other Transients, Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado Boulder.

Drabek, T E 1999 Disaster-Induced Employee Evacuation, Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado Boulder.

Drabek, T E and Gee, C Y 2000 Emergency Management Principles and Application for Tourism, Hospitality and Travel Management. Emmitsburg, Maryland: FEMA's Emergency Institute.

Thomas E Drabek is Professor of Sociology at the University of Denver, Colorado 80208-2948 (zted@aol.com) . He expresses his thanks to Ruth Ann Drabek for her help in preparing this manuscript. Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.