Pedestrian evacuation time maps, population estimates, and cruise ship passenger estimates for USVI tsunami-hazard zones

These datasets support the conclusions in the journal article entitled " Population vulnerability of residents, employees, and cruise-ship passengers to tsunami hazards in complex seismic regions: a case study of the U.S. Virgin Islands" as described in the abstract below: Reducing the potential for loss of life from tsunamis is challenging on islands located in complex seismic regions given the multiple sources that surround islands, differences among islands in the amount of time to evacuate before wave arrival, and the high number of residents, employees, and tourists in tsunami-hazard zones. We examine variations in population vulnerability in island communities to multiple tsunami threats and use the United States territory of the U.S. Virgin Islands (USVI), including St. Thomas, St. John, and St. Croix islands, as our case study. We estimate the tsunami-hazard exposure of residents, employees, and cruise-ship passengers on vessels docking at USVI marine facilities, as well as model pedestrian travel times out of inundation zones for 13 credible tsunami scenarios. Results indicate that the threat to life safety in USVI posed by tsunamis is not equal among the three islands, both in terms of the magnitude of people in hazard zones and the amount of time available to evacuate for the various scenarios. The number of employees and cruise-ship passengers in tsunami-hazard zones is orders of magnitude higher than the number of residents, suggesting that risk assessments that only account for residents are under-estimating threats to life safety from tsunamis. Finally, reducing departure delays has a greater impact than increasing pedestrian travel speeds on reducing the number of people that may have insufficient time to evacuate hazard zones before wave arrival.

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  "010:12"
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  "geospatial"
]