Disasters are becoming increasingly present in our everyday lives. The Tianjin explosion in 2015 is a disturbing illustration of how devastating the effects of poor disaster risk management can be. Since disaster risk is a complex interplay between vulnerability, exposure and hazards, the analysis and evaluation of these factors is of critical importance. The responsibility of this objective lies in disaster risk management in order to ultimately minimize this risk and increase resilience to prevent disasters such as the Tianjin explosion in 2015 from occurring in the future. In this context, the aim of this master’s thesis was to evaluate the usability of dashboards for disaster risk management and to investigate whether decision making and the communication flow could be significantly improved in comparison to traditional solutions such as static maps. Within the scope of this master’s thesis, a dashboard prototype was designed and developed on the basis of a static map of the Tianjin explosion in 2015, under consideration of the user needs of a previously identified core user employed in the field of disaster risk management. By conducting several user tests, expert interviews and analyses, a high usability of dashboards for disaster risk management purposes was ultimately found. Furthermore, a general improvement of decision making processes and communication flow by dashboards has been identified in the course of a potential analysis. Finally, by conducting an online survey, the concept of the dashboard prototype was transferred to the disaster risk management community in order to investigate how the various disaster risk management stakeholders generally estimate the usability and relevance of dashboards in this field.     «

Disasters are becoming increasingly present in our everyday lives. The Tianjin explosion in 2015 is a disturbing illustration of how devastating the effects of poor disaster risk management can be. Since disaster risk is a complex interplay between vulnerability, exposure and hazards, the analysis and evaluation of these factors is of critical importance. The responsibility of this objective lies in disaster risk management in order to ultimately minimize this risk and increase resilience to pre...     »