Hazardous Waste Cleanup and Disaster Management. (cover story)

This article focuses on the intercorrelation between hazardous waste cleanup and disaster management in the U.S. For those who have worked in the field of natural hazards and emergency management, the implication of the need for toxic waste management are allegedly both challenging and perplexing. They represent issues of public safety and environmental health that are potentially threatening to the nation's future that are floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, and other catastrophic events that fall within the natural disaster rubric. Until the time of Three Mile Island, Love Canal, and Times Beach, environmental disasters were generally outside the areas of concern and expertise in the U.S. The role of emergency managers and disaster-relief specialists was reactive, with little concern about why it happened or who was responsible. Although disaster-relief specialists have been responsible for evacuations following accidents involving hazardous materials and for hospital emergency room treatment of victims of chemical exposure, toxic waste allegedly is a national problem beset by a variety of scientific, legal, political, community, and industry-related influences and consideration that have both positive and negative impacts.