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This study provides an overview of the impact of the 2021 Summer floods in the Netherlands and the assessment of the effectiveness of various adaptation measures, evacuation strategies, and their impact on society. The floods were characterized by record rainfall in the cross-border region of the Meuse and Rhine basins and resulted in devastating losses in the Netherlands, Germany and Belgium. The study reports on a household survey conducted with 1,509 households in the wake of the 2021 flood event in the southern part of the Netherlands (province of Limburg). Using a descriptive approach, we present household experiences during several stages of the disaster management cycle, reporting on experienced flood hazard and impacts, evacuation, flood damage mitigation measures, the compensation progress, risk perceptions, and stress. Our findings highlight the role of early warnings and flood risk information provision in flood risk management. Risk perceptions influence both adaptation and evacuation behavior, as respondents who were aware of flood risks beforehand took significantly more flood damage mitigation measures compared with those who were not aware. Flood damage mitigation measures, such as building with water-resistant materials and elevating valuables, reduced flood damage by 20% to 50%. Our survey shows that of those who received warnings, the majority actually evacuated. However, residents not aware of any evacuation advice evacuated significantly less. Additionally, the majority (75%) of respondents experienced high or very high stress during and after the flood, which is most likely related to the destructive flood impacts and the slow and uncertain compensation experienced by many respondents. This paper describes the flood event and its consequences to provide insights into Dutch disaster management and what can be learned for potential future disasters in other contexts., Hydraulic Structures and Flood Risk

Protection motivation theory (PMT) has become a popular theory to explain the risk-reducing behavior of residents against natural hazards. PMT captures the two main cognitive processes that individuals undergo when faced with a threat, namely, threat appraisal and coping appraisal. The latter describes the evaluation of possible response measures that may reduce or avert the perceived threat. Although the coping appraisal component of PMT was found to be a better predictor of protective intentions and behavior, little is known about the factors that influence individuals’ coping appraisals of natural hazards. More insight into flood-coping appraisals of PMT, therefore, are needed to better understand the decision-making process of individuals and to develop effective risk communication strategies. This study presents the results of two surveys among more than 1,600 flood-prone households in Germany and France. Five hypotheses were tested using multivariate statistics regarding factors related to flood-coping appraisals, which were derived from the PMT framework, related literature, and the literature on social vulnerability. We found that socioeconomic characteristics alone are not sufficient to explain flood-coping appraisals. Particularly, observational learning from the social environment, such as friends and neighbors, is positively related to flood-coping appraisals. This suggests that social norms and networks play an important role in flood-preparedness decisions. Providing risk and coping information can also have a positive effect. Given the strong positive influence of the social environment on flood-coping appraisals, future research should investigate how risk communication can be enhanced by making use of the observed social norms and network effects.