Complexity Theory of Natural Disasters: Boundaries of Self-Structured Domains.- March 1990 Hail-storm Damage in Sydney, Australia.- A Test of the Cyclicity of Earthquakes.- Climate Change, Extreme Events and the Canadian Insurance Industry.- Problems for Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Analysis.- Atmospheric Hazards Preparedness in Bangladesh: A Study of Warning, Adjustments and Recovery from the April 1991 Cyclone.- Estimation of Response Spectra in the Severely Damaged Area During the 1995 Hyogo-Ken Nambu Earthquake.- Federal Legislation for Disaster Mitigation: a Com-parative Assessment Between Canada and the United States.- Arias Intensity Assessment of Liquefaction Test Sites on the East-Side of San Francisco Bay Affected by the Loma Prieta, California, Earthquake of 17 October 1989.- The Behaviour of a Man-Made Island During the Great Hanshin Earthquake, Japan.- Mexico, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Kobe: What Next?.- Meeting Report: Hazards-96: Concluding Plenary Session and Discussion.

Earthquakes and Atmospheric Hazards contains a selection of papers that were presented as part of the Sixth International Symposium on Natural and Man-Made Hazards (HAZARDS-96) held in Toronto, Canada during July, 1996. The Symposium was very timely, given the large number of natural disasters that have occurred in various parts of the world during the 1990s, the United Nations' International Decade for Natural Disaster Reduction (IDNDR). The human reaction to these disasters has varied widely from one event to the next and the economic and social costs have been immense with damage running into billions of dollars. Having in everyone's mind the Northridge, California (1994) and the Kobe, Japan (1995) earthquakes, the volcanoes in the Philippines, the cyclones and related storm surges in Bangladesh, and the floods in North America and Europe caused by heavy rains, the Symposium attracted more than one hundred papers covering various aspects of these events. The eleven papers included in this volume deal with the scientific and management issues of those earthquakes and atmospheric hazards that occurred during the late 1990s, with emphasis on the preparedness aspects. A summary report of the HAZARDS-96 Symposium and recommendations adopted by the participants is also included.
Earthquakes and Atmospheric Hazards forms an excellent reference for scientists, students, engineers, the insurance industry, authorities specializing in public safety and natural hazards preparedness and mitigation plans.