Guide to Tsunamis for Hotels & Hotel Guests (NEAMTIC)

The booklet, A Guide to Tsunamis for Hotels, summarizes steps that will guide hotels to prepare for tsunami hazards. The guidebook is to be use by hotel management; it is intended to direct them on how to build the hotel’s capacity in evacuation planning for tsunami emergency. The guidebook outlines the necessary steps to be undertaken, such as preliminary preparedness assessment using a checklist from the “Tsunami Ready” Toolbox, understanding the warnings (natural warning and official warning), deciding on an evacuation strategy, consideration for a hotel to be an evacuation area and the standard operating procedures for tsunami emergency.
This guidebook is devided into five parts. The first part provides a brief information of what is a tsunami and why it is important for hotels to address this hazard as part of their business. Part 2 decribes the tsunami hazard in the North-Eastern Atlantic and the Mediterranean Seas and efforts that has been taken in response to mitigate the hazard. Part 3 focuses on aspects that hotels need to take into consideration in building tsunami preparedness. This part also elaborates three different situations that influences evacuation strategies. Part 4 elaborates on considerations for a hotel to decides if the hotel could be a tsunami evacuation area, including determining the evacuation place in the hotel premises and on the signage needed for the evacuation place. Finaly, part 5 highlights the evacuation planning and procedures for the hotel that may serve as their standard operating procedures in tsunami emergency.
This guidebook explains the steps in building tsunami preparedness, however, to successfully develop the plans and procedures the hotel has to do all the ground work. It is recommended to work through participatory approach with all hotel stakeholders (staff and management) to simultaneously build in the capacity and ownership. At the same time, the hotel should also coordinates with the local disaster management office and/or other local authorities and stakeholders working on disaster and emergency management (for example red cross) to know more about the tsunami risks in the area as well as other local disaster management issues. (The above was modified from the Executive Summary)

This guidebook is developed in cooperation with Jakarta Tsunami Information Centre UNESCO/IOC - UNESCO Office Jakarta. For more Information please contact: North-Eastern Atlantic and Mediterranean Tsunami Information Centre (NEAMTIC), http://neamtic.ioc-unesco.org/