Mar 29, 2024  
College Catalog 2018-2019 
    
College Catalog 2018-2019 [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

GEO 107 Violent Earth: Natural Hazards and Disasters

Credits: (3)
In this course, students will investigate the earth processes that have a direct, often sudden and violent, impact on human society. Tornadoes, floods, wildfires, earthquakes, hurricanes, droughts, and volcanic eruptions are naturally occurring events that often have major impacts on humans. Students will explore the atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, and geosphere in their study of extreme events. Each disaster will be presented first as a hazard, then as a case study where students will investigate the human response to each extreme event and discuss prediction, risk analysis, and policy implications related to disaster preparedness, mitigation, and prevention measures. At the end of the course, students will understand the earth processes that drive hazardous events, illustrate how these processes interact with our civilization, and describe how we can better adjust to their often devastating effects. Satisfies the science elective requirement of the Math/Science curriculum and also satisfies the science requirement for those curricula that require science. GEO 107 consists of three one-hour lectures per week or equivalent.