Part I. Emergency situations Chapter 1. Types of Disasters and Emergencies Key words and terms:

Environment Ecology Disaster, catastrophe Local, regional or global disaster Pollution, pollutants Contaminate, poison Urban Chemical effluents Waste Discharge Effluents Activity

Emergency On-site and off-site emergency Radioactivity Fallout Emission Dump Acid rain Source Extinct Engender Common(s) Ultimate sink

Text 1. General Classification of Disasters and Emergencies

The most general classification of the disasters is according to their nature and causes. We can define natural and industrial catastrophes or man-made emergencies. Natural disasters are caused by the forces of nature: an earthquake, flood, drought, tornado, hurricane, volcano eruption are among them. But human activity strongly influences the environment too. And the more industries develop, the more often the industrial disasters happen. All of us know about radioactive catastrophe at the Chernobyl power plant. Chemical disasters, fires, explosions and etc. also threaten our lives, nature and the environment.

Defining the boundaries between acceptable human impacts and crisis impacts on the atmosphere and oceans is a demanding and rather subjective task.

Several types of human activity interact with geophysical processes to affect the atmosphere in ways that engender crisis situations. The most obvious example of local effects is urban air pollution resulting from automobile emissions, home heating and cooling, and industrial processes. The Denver "brown cloud" is a case in point, as is the extreme pollution in Mexico City. Such pollution can occur within one political jurisdiction or across state, provincial, or international borders. Air pollution is one of those problems to which almost everyone in the urban area contributes.

Acid rain is an example of pollution of a regional atmospheric commons. Industrial processes release pollutants, which can then interact with the atmosphere and be washed out by rainfall. Acid rain has caused the health of forest ecosystems to deteriorate in such locations as the north-eastern part of North America, central Europe, and Scandinavia. The trajectories of airborne industrial pollutants moving from highly industrialised areas across these regions have been studied. The data tend to support the contention that while acid rain is a regional commons problem, it is also a problem of global interest.

A nation or a state can put any chemical effluents, which it thinks to be necessary for its well-being, into its own airspace. But then the atmosphere's fluid motion can move those effluents across international borders. The purpose of the tall smokestack, for example, was to put effluents higher into the air, so they would be carried away and dispersed farther from their source. The tall stacks turned local air pollution problems into regional ones. In many instances, they converted national pollution into an international problem.

The oceans are the ultimate sink for pollutants. Whether they come from the land or the atmosphere, they are likely to end up in the oceans. This becomes a truly global commons problem, as currents carry pollutants from the waters of one country into the waters of others.

Emergency situations are classified as on-site and off-site emergencies.

An on-site emergency is that which only affects the site on which the emergency has occurred. Off-site emergencies are those which affect people, property and the environment beyond the site boundary. They also can be considered as local, regional and global emergencies. The meltdown at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant was an off-site emergency.

Exercise 1. Answer the following questions.

1) In what two major groups can all disasters be divided?

2) What types of ecological catastrophes are there?

3) Give the examples of local, regional and global environmental disasters.

4) How are emergency situations classified?

5) Give the examples of on-site and off-site emergencies.

Exercise 2. Complete the following sentences with the correct form of the word.

1) The________ nations of the West have stopped shipment of hazardous

wastes to the developing countries.

a) industry b) industrialised c) industrialist d) industrious

2) Industrial emissions that ________ the air must be reduced.

a) pollution b) pollutant c) pollute d) polluting

3) The standard of living in ________ countries is lower than that in developed

countries.

a) emergent b) emerge c) emergence d) emergency

4) Britain has agreed to cut ________ of nitrogen oxide from power stations.

a) emit b) emitter c) emissions d) emitted

5) Dealing with technological catastrophe involves ____________ with all levels of government, rescue teams and military resources.

a) interact b) interacted c) interaction d) interactive

Exercise 3. Match the terms in column A with their definitions in column B.

A	В
1) impact 2) engender 3) urban 4) deteriorate 5) ultimate 6) meltdown 7) extinct	a) connected with a town or city b) an accident with a nuclear reactor, allowing radioactivity to escape с) which no longer exists d) the effect that situation has on something e) to become worse f) to be a cause of a situation g) final

Exercise 4. Check your vocabulary. Which of these disasters are natural? Which ones can be the result of human error?

earthquake, plane crash, famine, flood, drought, shipwreck,

explosion, hurricanes, fire, tornado