Significant research findings about the January-July 2022 floods in New South Wales and Queensland were featured in the July 2023 issue of the Australian Journal of Emergency Management (AJEM), based on the results of Natural Hazards Research Australia’s Community experiences of the 2022 eastern Australia floods project.
A primary aim of the project was to learn from the experiences of those affected by the floods and draw out key insights of relevance to policy and practice across emergency management.
The report, Learning from the experiences of residents: January to July 2022 floods, was authored by researchers involved in the project, A/Prof Mel Taylor, A/Prof Fiona Miller (Macquarie University), Prof Kim Johnston, A/Prof Anne Lane (Queensland University of Technology), Dr Barbara Ryan, A/Prof Rachel King (University of Southern Queensland), Dr Harriet Narwal, Madeleine Miller (Macquarie University), Dipika Dabas (University of Southern Queensland) and Helga Simon (Macquarie University).
It provides an overview of the 2022 eastern Australia floods and the trauma-informed community research methods used throughout this project to understand what community members experienced before, during and shortly after this disaster.
Importantly, the AJEM report highlights high-level themes evident within the findings, specifically relating to flood ‘shock’ that community members felt, the power of community connection during and after a disaster, findings about why people chose to shelter in place during the floods, and how to use the vital post-disaster insights that this research provides.
In addition to AJEM, these evidence-based insights on preparedness, response and the early stages of recovery are being provided to stakeholders to help reduce future flood risk and support improvements in community safety in future disasters.
The research has since been extended into Tasmania, with Victoria and South Australia soon to follow. Find out more about this research and read about the findings in detail here.
AJEM is published by the Australian Institute of Disaster Resilience, profiling recent prominent natural hazards and emergency management research. Read the AJEM edition in full or download the PDF at https://knowledge.aidr.org.au/resources/ajem-july-2023/.