Geological Hazard Potential at the Baltic Sea and Its Coastal Zone: Examples from the Eastern Gulf of Finland and the Kaliningrad Area - The Baltic Sea Basin - page 340

self-reinforcing global warming and the instability of the west Antarctic ice sheets
are categorized as “Pythia”-type risk with both probability and extent of damage
unknown. Major parts of the technological hazards including, for example, the
accidents during exploitation, transport, and storage of oil or gas as well as the oper-
ation of nuclear power stations and the storage of nuclear waste are classified as a
“Damocle”-type risk with low probability but high extent of damage (Fleischhauer
2006 ) .
The methodology of natural and technological hazard characterization and map-
ping was developed by P. Schmidt-Thomé ( 2005 , 2006 ) . Hazards and aggregated
hazard maps - for instance, the risk map of Europe - can be used as an effective
tool for spatial planning (Schmidt-Thomé 2006 ) .
In Russia, there are some approaches and methods for classification of the natu-
ral (including geological) and technogenic hazards. First of all, the natural hazards
are divided into two groups: catastrophic (threatening human life) and unfavorable .
As a rule the catastrophic processes (events) are characterized by an unknown prob-
ability and a high rate or intensity. Among the catastrophic hazards, there are such
events as meteorite impacts, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, landslides,
mud flows, avalanches, hurricanes, and floods (Har'kina 2000 ) . One of the impor-
tant features of the mentioned hazards is the cascade character of the processes -
earthquakes can provoke landslides and tsunamis, and surges and floods cause active
coastal erosion. Social vulnerability, which accompanies these catastrophic pro-
cesses, depends on their intensity and rate as well as on the development level
of the society. Natural hazards cannot be completely avoided, but in case of their
prediction and sustainable spatial planning measures (coastal protection structures,
aseismic constructions, and timely evacuation of people), it is possible to reduce the
vulnerability to hazards.
Unfavorable hazardous processes can negatively influence the environment and
components of human life without direct risk to the human life (Har'kina 2000 ) .
Usually, such processes have a long duration when compared with human life-
time. This group of hazard processes includes coastal erosion, sea-level changes,
swamping, and karst.
According to the Russian State Standard classification, the geological hazards
can be divided into two groups depending on their driving forces - endogenic
processes (caused by Earth's tectonic and thermodynamic factors) and exogenic
processes (controlled mostly by factors external to the lithosphere, such as the sun's
energy, atmosphere, hydrosphere, and gravitation). The extent of damage of a geo-
logical hazard depends on the probability of its occurrence and intensity (duration,
rate and area of source, volumes of the rock masses involved in the process, etc.)
(Dzeker 1992 , 1994 ) .
The theory and methods of the probabilistic long-term prognosis of exogenic
processes were established by the Russian Research Institute of Hydrogeology and
Engineering Geology in 1975 and have been used since that time (Krupoderov 1994 ,
Sheko and Krupoderov 1994 , Osipov and Shoigu 2002 ) . The exogenic processes are
regarded as open multicomponent systems. The occurrence of each single process
is caused by interaction of many factors which can be divided into three groups: