
Revealing FEMA Risks: Its Relatively High In Utah For This
See the National Risk Index for FEMA
In the last while there have been wildfires, earthquakes, and hurricanes causing destruction and dominating the news. If you have lived a while you begin to realize disasters often happen in the same places.
FEMA, the government agency that steps in when home and property is affected by catastrophic weather events, has an interactive map on their site. It shows the different parts of the country where the risk is high for different natural hazards.
You can select anything from avalanches to drought, earthquakes to ice storms and more. You can also look a community reliance and social vulnerability.
How Does Utah Fare with Natural Disasters?
In the category of all natural hazards, Utah is relatively high, specifically in the Wasatch Front and Washington County in Southern Utah. What hazards present the biggest problem in these areas?
The Wasatch Front was near the top in avalanches and earthquakes. There is also risk for heat waves and lightning. Landslides are a problem in all of the mountains and especially in the eastern part of Utah.
Washington County is near the top for flooding and heat waves. Not a big surprise as the county has seen some of both.
Utah is a Good Place to Live if Something Does Happen.
One good sign from the map is Utah is high for community resilience and low for social vulnerability. It seems like the beehive state is quick to recover from natural disasters when they do occur.
This is a positive result of the strong community and tendency to look out for each other I would imagine. Looking at the interactive map, Utah is a pretty safe place to live overall.
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Gallery Credit: Dom DiFurio & Jacob Osborn