Disasters such as earthquakes, hurricanes, wildfires, and nuclear incidents threaten the safety of Americans at home: now, and in the future. Whether these disasters occur in large urban areas or isolated rural communities, they often result in evacuations. Most evacuations in the United States occur by private automobile; however, a significant portion of the U.S. population lacks access to a personal vehicle and relies on mass transit. Others live on islands and in isolated communities with limited roads for vehicle evacuation.

The failure to evacuate 20,000 people from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina suggests that additional means of evacuation are needed, especially for the carless, elderly, and other vulnerable populations. The U.S. Government has planned for many disaster response activities using vessels. This includes lodging first responders onboard ships and the transportation of supplies by sea. Additionally, the U.S. Government is prepared to use vessels in support of Non-combatant Evacuation Operations abroad and Migrant Interdiction Operations off the U.S. coast. Despite the need for additional evacuation resources and the proven value of vessel evacuation abroad, formal planning for domestic evacuation by sea has yet to occur at the national level.  

In the 1930’s and 1940’s, Dr. Kurt Lewin asserted that to implement change, restraints must be mitigated and drivers enhanced. This paper applies Lewin’s theories to conduct a force-field analysis of the barriers and drivers that prevent the development of waterborne evacuation capability in the United States. This is accomplished through a review of relevant literature and semi-structured interviews with 24 subject matter experts to elicit their perceptions on waterborne evacuation, identify the technological, behavioral, and institutional barriers to evacuation by sea, and develop solutions to the identified barriers. The results of this work are intended to provide a foundation for future research into domestic evacuation by sea and to help emergency managers conduct waterborne evacuation in the future. 

Project Team 

Lead Researcher: David Ostwind, PhD Candidate, URI Department of Marine Affairs (davidostwind@uri.edu) 

Principal Investigator: Professor Austin Becker, URI Department of Marine Affairs (abecker@uri.edu)  

This research is part of the Marine Affairs Coastal Resilience Lab. web.uri.edu/MACRL