Risk & Crisis Management in Tourism Sector:
Recovery from Crisis
in the OIC Member Countries
25
Although the likely path of certain extreme weather-related events, such as tropical storms, can be
tracked and precautions taken to move tourists to safe locations, many types of geological event
cannot be predicted. Depending on where they occur and where their impacts are felt, significant
geological events are likely to cause major disruption in the normal operation of tourism
operations: infrastructure, communications and facilities can be damaged and rendered non-
operational, and power and water supplies can suffer outages. These will present challenges in
evacuating tourists out of the affected areas and uncomfortable conditions for those who remain.
Significant geological events affecting tourism in recent years include:
 The Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004 which affected 11 countries, most
severely Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand, with over 230,000 fatalities.
 The Nepal earthquake of April 2015 in which nearly 9,000 persons died.
 The March 2011 offshore earthquake and tsunami that caused the loss of 22,000 lives
and crippled the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant on the east coast of Japan.
Extreme Weather: events in this category include hurricanes, floods, and prolonged drought.
Examples include:
 Hurricane Katrina and the extensive flooding in New Orleans in 2010, with the loss of
over 1,800 lives.
 Wildfires in natural areas brought about by lightning strikes or human activity, for
instance the fires around Gatlinburg, Tennessee, in December 2016 which resulted in
14 deaths and widespread destruction of tourist facilities, or the fires in Portugal in June
2017 which killed over 60 people.
Anthropogenic: The principal human-induced environmental events are climate change, pollution
(of air and water), and deforestation.
Many nations or countries with significant low-lying areas identify climate change as one of the
biggest threats they face in respect of their tourism industry. For instance, a study of the
vulnerability of the tourism sector to climate change conducted in the Maldives found that over
three-quarters of tourism businesses believed that climate change would be detrimental to their
business, impactingmost severely on diving and snorkeling because of sea-level rises and coral reef
bleaching (Maldives Ministry of Tourism, 2013), while in Australia, severe bleaching of coral along
the Great Barrier Reef due to warmer ocean temperatures is causing concern that tourists will be
deterred (Arup, 2016).
1.5.2. Societal/Political Events
Societal and political events affecting tourism include crime, politically motivated disturbances,
terrorism, wars, and human rights abuses. A growing concern is when threats are perpetrated by
external influences, especially when added to domestic unrest.