Spatial analysis for identifying concentrations of urban damage

Disasters resulting from earthquakes, hurricanes, fires, floods, and terrorist attacks can
result in significant and highly concentrated damage to buildings and infrastructure within
urban regions. Following such events, it is common to dispatch investigation teams to
catalog and inventory damage locations. In recent years, these data gathering efforts have
been aided by developments in high resolution satellite remote sensing technologies (e.g.
Matsuoka & Yamazaki, 2005) and by advances in ground-based field data collection (e.g.
Deaton & Frost, 2002). Damage inventories are typically presented as maps showing the
location and damage state of structures in part or all of an effected region. In some cases
information on the post-event condition of major infrastructure systems such as
transportation, power, communications, and water networks is also included.