Introduction Floods are classified as one of the hydrological hazards affecting many countries worldwide. With most weather-related disasters occurring in developing countries, demographics and socioeconomic pattern changes have contributed to many losses relating to water-related disasters such as floods. South Africa is among the developing countries most frequently affected by natural disasters, particularly floods. Thus, this study assessed the causes and impact of floods on the communities of Bronville and Hani-park in Welkom in the Free State Province in South Africa.Methods The study adopted a quantitative approach, using a structured questionnaire to collect the data. The study used an R statistical package to analyze the data and applied descriptive statistics and a series of Generalized linear models to examine the impacts of floods in the community.Results The findings reveal a community-wide concern about flooding impacts. There was a statistically significant difference between whether floods affected your physical structure as an outcome variable and how the flooding affected participants (Wald chi 62 = 30.364; p = 0.001). Also, a significant difference was found regarding how floods affect the water quality in your community (Wald chi 2 = 1.496; p = 0.030). The subjective perception of flood impacts on households has been reported to be aligned with observed damage to physical structures, underscoring the direct influence of floods on various household elements. The study also emphasises the costly nature of flood recovery and the potential strain on household resources due to flooding. Respondents indicated floods adversely affect vegetation, soil stability, and ecological dynamics. he study also, reveals that while some residents affected by flooding reach out to their municipalities for support, many do not seek or receive financial assistance.Discussion The study concludes that floods have a considerable socioeconomic impact on households and communities, particularly regarding repair costs for flood-related damages. In addition, the study concludes that floods have significant implications for drinking water quality in the community, with statistical evidence supporting the claim that floods contribute to water quality degradation. The findings of flood preparedness suggest a clear gap in early warning dissemination and evacuation planning tailored to the study community's needs. The findings of this study underscore the urgent need for comprehensive and sustainable flood mitigation strategies in vulnerable communities like Bronville and Hani-park.

High Mountain Asia (HMA) shows a remarkable warming tendency and divergent trend of regional precipitation with enhanced meteorological extremes. The rapid thawing of the HMA cryosphere may alter the magnitude and frequency of nature hazards. We reviewed the influence of climate change on various types of nature hazards in HMA region, including their phenomena, mechanisms and impacts. It reveals that: 1) the occurrences of extreme rainfall, heavy snowfall, and drifting snow hazards are escalating; accelerated ice and snow melting have advanced the onset and increased the magnitude of snowmelt floods; 2) due to elevating trigger factors, such as glacier debuttressing and the rapid shift of thermal and hydrological regime of bedrock/snow/ice interface or subsurface, the mass flow hazards including bedrock landslide, snow avalanche, ice-rock avalanches or glacier detachment, and debris flow will become more severe; 3) increased active-layer detachment and retrogressive thaw slumps slope failures, thaw settlement and thermokarst lake will damage many important engineering structures and infrastructure in permafrost region; 4) multi-hazards cascading hazard in HMA, such as the glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) and avalanche-induced mass flow may greatly enlarge the destructive power of the primary hazard by amplifying its volume, mobility, and impact force; and 5) enhanced slope instability and sediment supply in the highland areas could impose remote catastrophic impacts upon lowland regions, and threat hydropower security and future water shortage. In future, ongoing thawing of HMA will profoundly weaken the multiple-phase material of bedrock, ice, water, and soil, and enhance activities of nature hazards. Compounding and cascading hazards of high magnitude will prevail in HMA. As the glacier runoff overpasses the peak water, low flow or droughts in lowland areas downstream of glacierized mountain regions will became more frequent and severe. Addressing escalating hazards in the HMA region requires tackling scientific challenges, including understanding multiscale evolution and formation mechanism of HMA hazard-prone systems, coupling thermo-hydro-mechanical processes in multi-phase flows, predicting catastrophes arising from extreme weather and climate events, and comprehending how highland hazards propagate to lowlands due to climate change.

On 15 January 2023, a shallow, moderate earthquake with a magnitude (Mw) of 4.7 and a depth of one kilometer struck the northern part of Leyte Island in the central Philippines. Originating along the northern Leyte segment of the Philippine Fault, a well-established creeping fault, the earthquake caused significant geologic, structural, and socio-economic impacts despite its low magnitude. Probable surface rupture and landslides were reported, leading to a comprehensive field investigation. Our investigation revealed an similar to 8 km discontinuous surface rupture along the northern Leyte segment of the Philippine Fault, with a maximum left-lateral displacement of 2 cm. This was the first documented occurrence of such a phenomenon associated with an earthquake of a magnitude less than 6, particularly along a creeping fault segment. The maximum ground shaking felt was reported on the PHIVOLCS Earthquake Intensity Scale (PEIS) to be VI (very strong), equivalent to a Modified Mercalli Intensity (MMI) of VI along the fault strike. However, strong motion accelerographs recorded a peak ground acceleration (PGA) of 0.407 g, equivalent to PEIS VIII (very destructive), attributed to local site amplification influenced by subsurface geology. In the area where the local site amplification occurred, limited liquefaction was observed on marshlands with recent and alluvial deposits. Two landslides were observed in the mountainous area west of the fault. Structural damages were noted in areas with PEIS VI intensity and areas transected by the surface rupture. Despite the earthquake's low magnitude, the event documented significant impacts, including surface ruptures, liquefaction, landslides, and severe structural damage. The peculiarities of this event are attributed to the shallowness of the earthquake source, and local site conditions, including geology, geomorphology, and soil properties, contributed to the severity of the impacts. Moderate in size, this earthquake emphasizes the importance of documenting moderate-sized earthquakes as a tool and guide for medium- and long-term earthquake risk assessment and resiliency.

Coastal inundation causes considerable impacts on communities and economies. Sea level rise due to climate change increases the occurrence of coastal flood events, creating more challenges to coastal societies. Here we intend to draw the understanding of coastal inundation from our early studies, and provide a silhouette of our approaches in assessing climate change impacts as well as developing risk-based climate adaptation. As a result, we impart a distinctive view of the adaption towards the integration of asset design, coastal planning and policy development, which reflect multiscale approaches crossing individual systems to regions and then nation. Having the approaches, we also discussed the constraints that would be faced in adaptation implementation. In this regard, we initially follow the risk approach by illustrating hazards, exposure and vulnerability in relation to coastal inundation, and manifest the impact and risk assessment by considering an urban environment pertinent to built, natural, and socioeconomic systems. We then extend the scope and recommend the general approaches in developing adaptation to coastal inundation under climate change towards ameliorating overall risks, practically, by the reduction in exposure and vulnerability in virtue of the integration of design, planning and polices. In more details, a resilience design is introduced, to effectively enhance the capacity of built assets to resist coastal inundation impact. We then emphasize on the cost-effective adaptation for coastal planning, which delineates the problem of under-adaptation that leaves some potential benefits unrealized or over-adaptation that potentially consumes an excessive amount of resources. Finally, we specifically explore the issues in planning and policies in mitigating climate change risks, and put forward some emerging constraints in adaptation implementation. It suggests further requirements of harmonizing while transforming national policies into the contents aligned with provincial and local governments, communities, and households.

The study analyzed synthetically spatiotemporal distribution and evolution status of moraine-dammed lakes and potential dangerous glacial lakes (PDGLs) in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau (QTP) and revealed integrated risk degree of county-based glacier lake outburst floods (GLOFs) disaster by combining hazard of PDGLs, regional exposure, vulnerability of exposed elements, and adaptability and using the analytic hierarchy process and weighted comprehensive method. The results show there are 654 moraine-dammed lakes (> 0.018 km(2)) with a total area of 200.25 km(2)in the QTP in the 2010s, of which 246 lakes with a total area of 78.38 km(2)are identified as PDGLs. Compared with 1990s, the number of lakes decreased only by 2.22%, whereas total lake area expanded by 25%. All PDGLs area increased by 84.40% and was higher significantly than 4.06% of non-PDGLs. The zones at very high and high integrated risk of GLOF disasters are concentrated on the middle Himalayas, middle-eastern Nyainqentanglha, and southern Tanggula Mountain. On the county scale, Nyalam, Tingri, Dinggye, Lhozhag, Zhongba, Gamba, Kangma of the Himalayas, and Nierong, Dingqing, Banbar, Baqing, Bomi, and Basu of the Nyainqentanglha are located in the very high-risk zone, whereas other areas have low and very low integrated risk. The regionalization results for GLOF disasters risk are consistent with the distribution of historical GLOF disaster sites.