Land acknowledgement

HazNet would like to acknowledge that it conducts its business on the traditional and ancestral lands of the First Nations, Inuit and Métis Peoples of Turtle Island, known as Canada.

HazNet is committed to reconciliation, including learning about and regularly acknowledging the historic and current relationship that exists between the unceded land on which we live and work and the First Nations, Inuit and Métis. Indigenous Peoples are the longest inhabitants and stewards of this land on which we all live and learn, and have long been using sustainability to mitigate risks and reduce the impacts of hazards.

We recognize that there are many ways of knowing, and strive to represent these ways in the material that we bring to you. We also encourage all our readers and contributors to consider how they can personally contribute to Canada’s reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples, by continuing to call out the continued use of colonial systems and processes in our field, and hold each other accountable to commit to action.

About HazNet

HazNet Magazine serves as the information dissemination platform of the Canadian Risks and Hazards Network.

The magazine is published biannually, both online and in limited hard copy format.

The platform is updated throughout the year to serve the information needs of practitioners and researchers working in the fields of disaster risk reduction, emergency management and resilience.

Our mandate is to foster an interdisciplinary and cross-sectoral education and engagement to enhance understanding of resilience, emergency management and disaster risk reduction.

We tell Canada’s resilience story.

Who is HazNet?

Shaun Koopman is originally from Hope, British Columbia,  and still considers himself a small-town mountain boy at heart. His mother’s family was born and raised in Haiti. His interest in emergency management was spawned by the 2010 Port-au-Prince earthquake in Haiti. Shaun has over seven years of experience teaching first responder training programs and presenting information campaigns to the public as a Canadian Red Cross First Aid Instructor and National Lifesaving Society Instructor Mentor. His additional volunteer responder experience stems from Hope Search and Rescue, the Canadian Red Cross Disaster Response Team, and B.C. Ambulance. Shaun is the Protective Services Coordinator for the Strathcona Regional District, based out of Campbell River on Vancouver Island.

Nicole Spence is a Program Advisor at Health Emergency Management BC (HEMBC) in Vancouver, BC. She holds a BA in Psychology and a GD in Public Health, with a focus on International and Global Health and Development. Her interests lie at the crossroads of climate change, global health and disaster management, which led her to a practicum with the Population and Public Health department at Fraser Health, followed by an internship with the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction in Geneva. Prior to her current role, she worked with national and international organizations, regional and provincial health authorities, NGOs, academic institutions and the private sector, primarily in web editing, communications, and knowledge and information management. Nicole is a Systematic Thinking Enforcer and Organizational Matrix Queen with HazNet.

Krystle Hamilton is originally from Northern Ireland but now considers Canada her home after living here for several years. She holds a B.A. (Honours) in Applied Disaster and Emergency Studies from Brandon University as well as her Associate Business Continuity Professional designation. She has a wide variety of interests within emergency management including writing functional Emergency Response Plans, promoting accessibility of Critical Incident Stress Management Systems for First Responders, and promoting the use of the Incident Command System within both the public and private sectors. Currently Krystle is a Municipal Support Officer with the Office of the Fire Commissioner in Manitoba. Prior to this role, Krystle was the Emergency Planning & Information Coordinator for Vancouver Airport Authority but has also held roles within consulting and emergency services. Krystle is a Talent Acquisition Coordinator and manages HazNet’s Job Board page: http://haznet.ca/job/

Carly Benson has both studied and worked in the field of emergency management for over a decade. As a practitioner, she has developed and managed emergency management programs and has responded to major disasters in both Alberta and British Columbia. As an academic, Carly is particularly interested in exploring disaster recovery through the lenses of systems thinking and human-centered design. She holds a Master of Arts in Disaster and Emergency Management and a Master of Design in Strategic Foresight and Innovation. Outside of emergency management, Carly enjoys hiking and scuba diving, learning photography, and writing children’s stories for her two nephews. She is an editor for HazNet.

Taylor Legere has experience working in disaster resilience and climate adaptation fields as a manager, designer, and researcher. She is currently studying in the Master of Landscape Architecture program at the University of British Columbia, with an interest in how urban spaces can be designed to increase resilience to climate change and extreme weather. Previously she completed a Bachelor of Arts in Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Waterloo. In 2025, she joined the HazNet team as a graphic designer.

Cindy Marven coordinates the Coast and Ocean Risk Communication Community of Practice initiated in 2017 by the Marine Environmental Observation, Prediction, and Response Network and supported since 2022 by the Ocean Frontiers Institute – Future Ocean and Coastal Infrastructures. She holds a Master of Science in Geography from the University of Victoria and for the past two decades, her work has centred around hazard and risk in marine and coastal environments. She is a copy editor for HazNet.

Lily Yumagulova has worked in government agencies, NGOs and media in Europe and North America in the fields of disaster risk reduction, community resilience, and climate change adaptation. In her work she emphasizes the value of bringing together academia, practitioners, policy makers, planners and media for reducing risk in communities. She holds degrees in Engineering (Emergency management), an M.Sc. in Risk Analysis (King’s College London), and a PhD in Resilience Planning at the University of British Columbia. She is the Editor for HazNet.