Background The challenges faced by the Global South during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic are compounded by the presence of informal settlements, which are typically densely populated and lacking in formalized sanitation infrastructure. Social distancing measures in informal settlements may be difficult to implement due to the density and layout of settlements. This study measures the distance between dwellings in informal settlements in Cape Town to identify the risk of COVID-19 transmission. Objective The aim of this paper is to determine if social distancing measures are achievable in informal settlements in Cape Town, using two settlements as an example. We will first examine the distance between dwellings and their first, second, and third nearest neighbors and then identify clusters of dwellings in which residents would be unable to effectively practice social isolation due to the close proximity of their homes. Methods Dwellings in the settlements of Masiphumelele and Klipfontein Glebe were extracted from a geographic information system data set of outlines of all informal dwellings in Cape Town. The distance to each dwelling’s first, second, and third nearest neighbors was calculated for each settlement. A social distance measure of 2 m was used (buffer of 1 m, as dwellings less than 2 m apart are joined) to identify clusters of dwellings that are unable to effectively practice social distancing in each settlement. Results The distance to each dwelling’s first 3 nearest neighbors illustrates that the settlement of Masiphumelele is constructed in a denser fashion as compared to the Klipfontein Glebe settlement. This implies that implementing social distancing will likely be more challenging in Masiphumelele than in Klipfontein Glebe. However, using a 2-m social distancing measure, it was demonstrated that large portions of Klipfontein Glebe would also be unable to effectively implement social distancing. Conclusions Effectively implementing social distancing may be a challenge in informal settlements due to their density. This paper uses dwelling outlines for informal settlements in the city of Cape Town to demonstrate that with a 2 m measure, effective social distancing will be challenging.

Approximately one billion people globally live in informal settlements with a large potential fire risk, where a single dwelling fire may result in a very large urban conflagration leaving hundreds, if not thousands, of people homeless. What is not well understood, however, is how fires in informal settlement dwellings develop and spread, and what influence the dwelling boundary has on these two areas. In this work, four different real-scale compartments were constructed and ignited under a large fire calorimeter hood. The cases include a typical thin metal-walled dwelling (baseline), a no leakage dwelling, a dwelling lined with cardboard and a dwelling with highly insulated walls. The fuel locations, fuel loads of 25 kg/m 2 , ignition method and ambient conditions were kept identical in four experiments. Important parameters of compartment fire development, such as heat release rate, gas temperatures, fuel mass loss rate, wall and ceiling temperature were recorded. To investigate the fire spread mechanism between dwellings, the incident radiation heat flux around the dwellings and projection flame length were measured as well. It was found that the boundary conditions in informal settlement significantly affect the fire dynamics and fire spread of informal settlement, and that current analytical/empirical equations are not capturing accurately experimental observations.

w sible due to the socio-cultural-political-economic issues associated with informal settlements. This is one of the first papers to demonstrate FDS models against full-scale ISD experiments.

Natural or human-made hazards may occur at any time. Although one might assume that individuals plan in advance for such potentially damaging events, the existing literature indicates that most communities remain inadequately prepared. In the past, research in this area has focused on identifying the most effective ways to communicate risk and elicit preparedness by means of public hazard education campaigns and risk communication programmes. Today, web-and mobile-based technologies are offering new and far-reaching means to inform communities on how to prepare for or cope with extreme events, thus significantly contributing to community preparedness. Nonetheless, their practical efficacy in encouraging proactive hazard preparedness behaviours is not yet proven. Building on behaviour change interventions in the health field and looking in particular at earthquakes and fire hazards, the challenging RISK team has reviewed the currently active websites, Web, and mobile applications that provide information about earthquake and home fire preparedness. The review investigates the type of information provided, the modality of delivery, and the presence of behaviour change techniques in their design. The study proves that most of the digital resources focus on a single hazard and fail to provide context-sensitive information that targets specific groups of users. Furthermore, behaviour change techniques are rarely implemented in the design of these applications and their efficacy is rarely systematically evaluated. Recommendations for improving the design of Web-and mobile-based technologies are made so as to increase their effectiveness and uptake for a multi-hazard approach to earthquake and home fire preparedness.

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PurposeGlobally, over 95% of fire related deaths and injuries occur in low- and middle-income countries. Within informal settlements, the risk of fire resulting in injury or death is particularly high. This paper examines fire risks in informal settlements in New Delhi and Cape Town, and tented informal settlements in Lebanon.Design/methodology/approachOur analysis draws on primary sources, secondary literature, statistical data and qualitative interviews.FindingsThe distribution of fire risk across urban societies is a fundamentally political issue. Residential fire risk can be tackled by accessible, affordable, safety-compliant housing. That said, important interim measures can be taken to mitigate fire risk. Some of the risks requiring attention are similar across our case studies, driven by high population densities; flammable housing materials; unreliable or inaccessible access to safe power sources; and – in the case of Cape Town and New Delhi particularly – the inability of fire services to reach sites of fire. However, these common risks are embedded in distinct social, economic and political contexts that must be placed at the center of any intervention. Interventions must also be aware that the risk of fire is not spread evenly within informal settlements, intersecting as it does with factors like gender, age, health and disability.Originality/valueInformal settlement fires have been under-studied to date. The studies that do exist tend to operate within disciplinary silos. This paper represents an important interdisciplinary approach to fire within informal settlements, which grounds technical data, modeling and experiments in political, social and economic realities.

More than 1 billion people are living in informal settlements and refugee camps where houses are commonly built from thermally-thin materials (e.g. steel/asbestos sheets). In fire safety literature there is insufficient attention describing the required conditions for flashover (e.g. Heat Release Rate needed for flashover,̇) in such compartments. In this work, ̇ and heat fluxes to the surroundings for compartments with thermally-thin boundaries were investigated using eight compartment fire tests built with 0.5 mm steel sheets and four fuel loads. Numerical simulations were conducted to validate FDS for this application, using the heat release rate inside and outside the compartment, the gas layer temperature and the heat fluxes to the surroundings. The validated model was employed to conduct demonstrative sensitivity and parametric studies to understand the heat balance for thermally-thin under-ventilated compartments. It was found that the heat transfer on/from the walls of the compartment is dominated by radiation, in contrast to the compartments with thermally thick boundaries where the wall conduction dominates. The radiative heat transfer coefficient hrad was then resolved numerically and correlated against the gas layer temperature, wall temperatures and the ̇ to create a semi empirical correlation for estimating the ̇.