After a long period of heavy rain and large quantities of water from melted
snow causing extreme rates of flow into rivers and lakes, flooding has
occurred upstream from a dam, and a number of buildings are threatened.
Considerable effort is being made to erect barriers to protect these
properties. Additional sluice gates need to be opened to prevent the water
rising faster than the protective barriers can be built. But this would result
in the same problem occurring downstream where barriers are perhaps
also being erected to protect property. The consequences of the physical
phenomenon can then occur in a completely different geographic location
to where measures, in this case opening sluice gates, are applied. The other
measures are being taken at two widely separated locations but despite the
distance between them, they are subject to a common physical dependency.
In such situations it can also sometimes be necessary to act on the legal
right to infringe the rights of others, in this case, in two different places.
What is more, it is very likely that the problem will be transferred from
one municipality to another, which further complicates the issue. Here, it is
largely the physical perspective of the course of events that will determine
the scope of responsibility of the response operation or operations. All the
organisations involved need to cooperate and be coordinated. It has never
been the purpose of legislation to create a situation where a municipal
rescue service should alone manage all the possible emergency situations
that can arise.
Example 3