Work

Quantitative assessment of crises via central moments

Year: 2025

Type: article

Abstract: We provide a widely applicable method to quantitatively assess the response of socio-technical systems to crises. The method generalizes the interpretability of a series of moments in terms of probability distributions to the breakdown and recovery phases of crises. These moments allow to unveil subtle differences in the reactions of distinct systems in view of a crisis, and, in part, serve as a measure of these systems’ resilience. Thereby, the moments extend existing measures of resilience by a well-defined procedure regarding the time domain that extracts relevant time scales of the systems’ reaction to a given crisis during breakdown and recovery. The method is illustrated by real-world data of German airports which experienced a dramatic drop in flight departures as a consequence of travel restrictions imposed in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic. • Quantitative assessment of crises based on few and natural conditions on the underlying data. • Resolution of subtle differences regarding distinct systems’ reaction to the same crisis. • Extraction of relevant scales from crisis data.

Source: Reliability Engineering & System Safety

DOI: 10.1016/j.ress.2025.111472

Authors: Stefan G. Fischer, Alexander Stolz

Institutions: University of Freiburg, Fraunhofer Institute for High-Speed Dynamics, Ernst-Mach-Institut

Language: English

Topic: Infrastructure Resilience and Vulnerability Analysis

Subfield: Civil and Structural Engineering

Field: Engineering

Domain: Physical Sciences

SDG: Industry, innovation and infrastructure

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $4,830