Child-Friendly Glossary

Accessibility: the ability to access a place

Alert: the condition following the notification of an imminent danger

Anthropic: everything that refers to a human being or to their activities

Assembly point: a safe place where the population temporarily gathers in the event of an emergency

Biodegradable: a substance that decomposes easily in nature due to the action of bacteria and microorganisms

Crowdsourcing: online project which requires the contribution of many people at the same time.

Connectivity: the ability to be connected with other people through means of communication

Danger: anything that can cause harm to the environment or people

Disaster: an event that causes serious harm and disruption or upheaval to normal life.

Disaster cycle:

DRR: Disaster Risk Reduction

Earthquake: A sudden shaking of the ground resulting from movements in the earth's crust.

Ecosystem: a set of animal and plant species that interact with each other and with the surrounding environment

Emergency: a critical situation that requires urgent or immediate action

Epicentre: the point on the earth's surface that is hit hardest by an earthquake

Exposure: the number of people and elements that can be damaged or affected because they are located in a risk area.

Fire: a destructive event caused by flames

Global warming: increase in the temperature of the Earth's surface due to human activity

Hypocentre: the point of origin of an earthquake from which seismic waves propagate

Landslide: the movement of a large mass of earth, rock or debris down a slope

Magnitude: the energy released by an earthquake

Mitigation: reducing the effects of a disaster.

Pollution: contamination of the environment, caused by human activities

Prediction: the identification of the risks and the causes that determine calamitous phenomena in specific territories

Prevention: The action of reducing vulnerability and exposure by preventing a risk from becoming a disaster.

Resilience: The ability to deal with calamitous events and overcome their effects.

Risk: the possibility that a phenomenon can cause damage to people and the environment in a given period of time and in a given area.

Safety: a condition when an individual is not in danger or when a risk can be prevented, reduced or eliminated.

Threat: probability that a calamitous event of a given intensity will occur in a given place within a given period of time

Toxic cloud: a set of toxic substances which are released into the air in mainly gaseous form, which are very dangerous to inhale

Tsunami: a phenomenon caused by underwater movements that can generate very high waves with potentially disastrous effects, especially on the coasts

Vulnerability: The predisposition to be affected or damaged by a disaster.