Hello my wonderful readers!
Today was the official first day of the PREEMPTIVE ASI program. Today was jam packed with extremely informative lectures, great coffee breaks (they gave us delicious Thai pastries to complement our coffee), and a welcome reception to end the day with.
So let me tell you a little bit about the program and why I was given this amazing opportunity to come to Thailand in the first place… PREEMPTIVE stands for Pacific Rim Earthquake Engineering Mitigation Protective Technologies International Virtual Environment. It is a program sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) that aims at training a diverse group of graduate students in the broad areas of protective systems and disaster mitigation. This program provides the opportunity to be able to explore topics in disaster science and resilient infrastructure from a highly multidisciplinary perspective. The program runs a workshop in a different country six times.I was selected to attend the workshop in Thailand, but last February it took place in Costa Rica, and the next few years will be in New Zealand, Chile, Puerto Rico, and Japan.
This year, the program includes students from the US, Thailand, the Congo, and Singapore. Makes it more exciting thinking of how diverse this bunch is!
The lectures today covered topics in earthquakes (Dr. Chintanapakadee) , tsunamis (Dr. Ruangrassamee), the effect from tsunamis to the hotel industry in Thailand (Dr. Jing Tang) , the assessment of tsunami hazard and coastal impacts (Dr. Patrick Lynett), disaster management (Dr. Nattleelawat), and flood and water security (Dr. Piyatida Ruangrassemee). Slider below shows the lecture in order respectively.
At the end of this program, we will be proposing an idea of what can best be done to improve the mitigation strategies and technology in Thailand when faced with a multi-hazard disaster. We will be giving a group presentation and submitting an NSF proposal by the last day.
Welcome Reception photos below. A traditional Thai dance was performed at the restaurant, so we were able to snap a few pictures with the dancers!
