iological systems such as animals and humans can be energetically autonomous for several days and some species endure even longer. Today's robotic systems aim to match the physical capabilities of their biological counterparts in terms of strength, agility, and dexterity, yet fail to display untethered operating times any longer than few hours.
We outline the objectives of the book, setting them in the context of disaster risk management in a changing world and introducing the role of warnings in mitigating weather-related disasters. We describe the warning value chain, linking the needs of the decision-maker with forecasting capability; identify the blockages where information is lost, which we call the “valleys of death”; …