Very few parts of the U.S. have been untouched by extreme weather.
According to a recent report, 90% of U.S. counties had a federally declared weather disaster between 2011 and 2021.
“Some counties have had as many as 12 disasters during that time,” says Amy Chester of Rebuild by Design. Her group recently released the Atlas of Disaster, an online map of these events.
“And the one thing that we found extraordinarily interesting is that no matter what state you look at, disasters are all over. It’s not just a coastal issue in a coastal state,” she says.
In addition to the number of disasters in each county, the atlas includes data on social vulnerability and energy reliability.
And it shows the federal cost of weather disasters in each state, which in some places topped $1,000 per resident over a decade.
“And why that’s important is that we’re able to show that we as Americans are all paying for this,” Chester says.
Climate change is expected to bring more extreme weather to many areas.
“So we hope that people really dig in kind of deep into this report and start questioning what is our government doing right now … and start getting involved,” Chester says.
Reporting credit: ChavoBart Digital Media
