Ontology-Based Modeling of Effect-Based Knowledge in Disaster Response

Emergency response and management requires the coordination of agencies and different services in a complex evolving situation. This in turn, requires diverse models representing detailed knowledge about the types of adverse events, their potential impact and the means and resources that are best suited for an effective response. The basic formal infrastructure incident assessment ontology (BFiaO) is oriented towards fulfilling these needs. BFiaO is a meta-model for handling infrastructure-related situations, but it did not provide models for a catalogue of adverse events and the means necessary for an adequate response. In this article, the authors present the key ontological commitments required for developing BFiaO-based extensible typologies of adverse events that are driven by the effects rather than by other aspects such as causes, or facilities affected. The model of a concrete case study is then presented that connects adverse event types to the kind of actions and resources required for mitigation.