Disaster means serious disruption of the functioning of a community or a society causing widespread human, material, economic or environmental losses that exceed the ability of the affected community or society to cope using its own resources (WHO).

A disaster is “a disruption of the human ecology that exceeds the capacity of the community to function normally”.

There are 5 different elements/constituents of a community that should be affected in terms of the disaster’s definition:

•- People;

•- Property (infrastructure, possessions and assets, public, private and cultural);

•- Services (governmental, NGO);

•- Livelihoods of the people (e.g. urban/ rural);

•- Environment (air, water, soil, built and natural, urban and rural).