Game Theory and Hurricane Florence
Source: https://abcnews.go.com/US/major-river-flooding-threat-posed-florence-heavy-rain/story?id=57857204
Hurricane Florence recently hit North and South Carolina leaving unaccountable destruction in its path. Some areas received two to three inches of rain per hour. Flooding destroyed many homes, cars, small businesses, roads, and other portions of the Carolinas’ infrastructure. The rain coupled with powerful winds even tore up buildings! Over 700,000 households and businesses are still without power in North Carolina. Mandatory evacuations were issued in some parts of these states. In other parts however, evacuation was suggested highly, but not mandatory. For these people the choice was somewhat like a game, but in this game, they were playing with their lives.
Game theory teaches us that when presented with multiple choices, a player will choose the option that benefits them most. The two options for this game were to either evacuate or stay and protect your house. There are different payoffs to different players depending on his or her specific situation. A player could stay and deal with the damage the storm is causing to his/her home as it occurs to minimize overall damage when the hurricane ends. In this situation the tradeoff is safety. By staying home, you risk being killed do to flooding or winds destroying your house. On the other hand, you may have a new family with young children and may not be willing to risk their lives, so you evacuate. The downside to this choice is that maximum damage would be caused to your house. Another factor to consider is there were multiple car crashes during evacuation, which increases risk of injury if you decide to evacuate. The choice is ultimately personal and figuring out your choice will be what is most beneficial to you.
The tradeoffs in this game may be dependent on other players in which case you must consider the dominant strategy and find Nash equilibrium. For example, if you own a hardware store and many people (other players) decide not to evacuate, then the best response to these players’ strategies, the Nash equilibrium, would be for you to stay to maximize profit from people who need to rebuild immediately after the storm subsides. This could potentially be the dominant strategy for the hardware store owner because he/she will benefit from either choice of the other players. If the other players stay the hardware store owner will maximize profit, but if others decide to evacuate he/she can still protect his/her own house and business to minimize damage.
The choice for this game is situational and depends on the individual player. At the end of the day though, this hurricane is a serious matter and I don’t mean to make light of the situation. It’s important that everyone stays safe in these conditions. Unfortunately, some people made the wrong choice and there have been 17 confirmed deaths due to Hurricane Florence. Luckily, hundreds of people have been rescued so far and there are many more first responders currently out looking for more people to help.