Handover of the Earthquake Report to Mayor Jørgen Vik of Lillestrøm Municipality
On December 10, NORSAR handed the Earthquake Report over to the Mayor of Lillestrøm, Jørgen Vik, accompanied by representatives from the County Governor of Oslo and Viken. The event was executed partly remote, with external representatives on Teams and Romerikes Blad on site.
This assessment, initiated by NORSAR, is crucial to increase knowledge of risks of earthquakes in Lillestrøm. The overall probability of risks of earthquakes in Norway are low – and below average in Lillestrøm. Nevertheless, casualties of such an event is long-reaching. Therefore, knowledge is key for future contingency plans.
This assessment is done by analysing primary and secondary effects of ROS including qualitative observations of regional historical earthquake data. The report recommends updating ROS analyses from 2018 with the presented results. As our Director, Anne Lycke, put it, the risk equation is risk equals danger times vulnerability and exposure.
Lillestrøm handles this equation every day and it is inherent in all their policies. Cooperation between public sector and research results in new knowledge – and as Mayor Vik uttered, “it does not become a society without us doing it together“. The Mayor is proud of having an internationally renowned research institute in his municipality and believes the harvesting of goods is mutual. On that note, he perceives the recommendations as reasonable and feasible, and of course, he is especially happy with the assessed low risk of earthquakes. Lastly, he assures that these recommendations will take the step into policy work because knowledge commits and risk management is inevitable.