Application of after action review and timeline analysis of the Koslanda landslide that occurred on 29 October 2014 in Sri Lanka

A massive landslide occurred on 29th October 2014 at Koslanda, Sri Lanka, and resulted in more than 35 casualties. We conducted After Action Review and Timeline Analysis on pilot basis and identified some challenges such as, 1) lack of common picture on disaster hindered the effective response by the government ; 2) disaster resilience education strengthened the knowledge of community residents, however gained knowledge couldn't result in achieving evacuation at the time of landslide ; 3) necessity of further improvement of landslide risk/hazard map and early warning criteria as well as systems ; and 4) importance of this kind of review after the disaster and maintenance of record. We believe that the lessons and experiences of Japan on landslide disaster risk management would be useful for improving the landslide disaster risk management in Sri Lanka, and hence continued capacity development efforts for Sri Lankan authorities through international development institutes such as the Japan International Cooperation Agency, JICA, are essential.