When your phone makes that unmistakable shrill sound and a disaster alert pops up, do you know what to do? You have one go bag? Do you have a place to crash for a few days? Do you have a way to get there? What about your kids or your pets? And if your roof cracks while you’re away, do you have enough cash to fix it? Have you considered moving altogether?
For millions of Americans, these are not imaginary concerns. It has already been a dangerous, deadly year of tornadoes, hurricanes, fireAnd the flood Across the United States. At this point, such extraordinary disasters are hardly surprising.
Extreme weather events are becoming more common, dangerous and destructive. Rising average temperature Sea levels are rising, increasing rainfall and making heat waves more common. At the same time, more and more people are living in vulnerable places coastal flooding And fire.
The good news is that fewer people are dying in natural disasters in general. People are adapting with better infrastructure, better forecasting, better warning, and better response later. This progress required people to take these risks seriously: invest in infrastructure improvements, spend years conducting research, and seek shelter when a siren sounds or an alert goes out.
Even in disaster-prone regions, however, complacency can build.
Memories of past disasters can fade quickly, while financial and policy incentives encourage people to rebuild in vulnerable areas or degrade natural defenses against threats. Even when a big storm is on the horizon, there are always some people who Decide to stay. Hurricane Ian of 2022 was one of the deadliest storms in US history, and most of the casualties were people who Decided not to evacuate. Residents cited various reasons: it is too expensive to leave, Logistics is very complicatedor past warnings were not implemented.
An amazing thing
In German, the term “Flood dementia,” or Flood dementiaDescribes how quickly even people directly affected by a flood go back to behaving as if the flood never happened.
Most people exist on the opposite end of the spectrum from the doomsday preppers who make bunkers and Underground food storage. Most of us haven’t reckoned with the reality of climate change affecting us at all.
And often, despite all the evidence to the contrary, people adopt a mindset that bad things won’t happen to them. Some of the country’s most vulnerable regions are seeing the most population expansion and building booms.
Unfortunately, bad things can happen It will happen to you — to all of us — as climate change expands the range of places that can flood or burn
This means an increasing number of people are facing risks they have never faced before, and it means they need to develop the foresight to prepare for them. The goal is not to avoid disaster and live in fear but to take meaningful steps to mitigate damage from threats before, during, and after it occurs. Otherwise, fragile progress in saving lives from disasters will be undone and many of us will end up in harm’s way.
Why is it hard to remember lessons from past disasters?
The history of natural disasters shows that people extrapolate to future events and take steps to reduce their losses, at least temporarily.
Hurricane Andrew, at that time The most expensive storm Ever to make landfall in the US, an inspired New Generation of Building Codes and regulations to make Florida homes more resilient to wind and flooding. Since Hurricane Katrina in 2005, now the costliest storm, insurance companies Increase their ratesYet there was a big uptick in people buying flood insurance for their homes in the region and further afield
People recognize that risk is also changing. After a big Tornado outbreak in December 2021, people in affected areas are beginning to voice that they have noticed that tornado patterns have changed over time and that their area is now more vulnerable than in the past. “I was amazed that they put it together,” said Kim Kloko McClain, a social scientist at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, which supports the National Weather Service. “They took this phenomenon that happened to them or happened to them and the communities around them, and they connected it to this broader environmental change.”
But the euphoria of disaster can fade quickly. A pattern observed is that after hurricanes increase in flood insurance purchases, many people gradually let their policies lapse in the years between major storms due to cost concerns or concerns about running out. One analysis showed that the bump could be Fade in three years.
In addition to disaster dementia, we also have our own destiny issues. One of the stranger incidents is what happens to people who cannot avoid their homes being swept away, flooded or burned down. Some people who avoid disaster will take the same precautions as those who are directly in the path of destruction, but a lot Study found That’s one A near-miss It can also create a perception that someone is less vulnerable or that an extreme event is less dangerous.
There are many variables that influence these beliefs. A study shows that the more financial flexibility someone has, the better Concerned about future disasters After a near-miss. Additionally, if a disaster forecast or warning doesn’t pan out, that’s what people can do Future warnings are less likely to work.
These perceptions change how much people are willing to pay to protect themselves and how much they will invest in protecting their communities from future destruction. Additionally, a low perception of risk makes it less likely that someone will seek shelter or evacuate when exposed to water, wind, or flames (or all three, as in recent cases). Hurricane Beryl) is barreling down.
It is also difficult for people to respond to disasters, even when they recognize that the threat is increasing.
Insurance payouts often cover restoring a property to the way it was, not upgrading it to withstand more devastating events in the future. Changes to flood and fire risk maps can make it more difficult to sell a home or buy an insurance policy, so people with few resources can be stuck in risky homes, even though they want to better protect themselves or move permanently.
All of this adds up to an alarming number of people who cannot act, think or realize that they could be hurt by a major disaster.
So how do you “scare” people without scaring them?
Although many natural disasters pass quickly, the process of people taking them more seriously takes years.
Disaster response and government officials need to be proactive in educating the public about emerging and growing threats. In places like Florida, there’s always one A large number of new arrivals For those who may not be familiar with what to do during a tropical storm, this education effort needs to be constant, explained Abdul Akeem Sadiqis a professor of public policy at the University of Central Florida who studies disaster response.
The goal, according to Sadiq, is to create a “culture of preparedness.” It’s where everyone from individual residents to neighborhood groups, first responders, city officials, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) rehearse coherent plans to deal with an impending disaster. Children learn to go to basements at school when tornado sirens go off, families map evacuation routes, utilities put extra line crews on standby to fix power outages, etc.
Creating this culture does not depend only on how people perceive their own risks; It depends on how much trust they have in the people in charge. “I think that trust in the government or the authority that issues the evacuation plan is very, very critical,” Sadiq said. “If I don’t trust FEMA and they’re telling me ‘you need to evacuate your local community,’ I’m probably not going to take that advice.”
How authorities express risks and warnings is also important. Too many false alarms can motivate people to warn and make alarms less effective when a disaster occurs. Risk assessments that use jargon or overwhelm readers with data can make it difficult for laypeople to analyze their hazard exposure.
One way to improve disaster response is to work through local officials and institutions who already have credibility and open lines of communication within their communities. Messaging around looming or ongoing threats must also account for the fact that some of the most vulnerable people have the hardest time getting information and preparing accordingly.
In this case, Language barrier May rise for residents of at-risk areas. Some people may not have a place to go during an evacuation, and others may not be physically able to move without help. A granular and tailored disaster response plan is needed to ensure that all of these people are safe during the next major hurricane or wildfire. “If we leave people behind, it’s a failure,” Sadiq said.
With rising sea levels and more frequent, severe weather extremes, these plans need to be redesigned on a regular basis to account for mounting risks. It will take some creativity to introduce people to threats that they have never personally experienced before. One idea is to develop visualizations and real-world interactives like markers on buildings that show how high storm surges can reach or monuments that show the boundaries of potential future wildfire zones.
At this point, some increases in warming and associated extreme weather are baked in, but the potential for destruction and human harm is not. That makes it even more urgent to take action now to reduce damage from disasters and save lives — improving forecasts, expanding early warning systems, adapting infrastructure.
But doing all this requires believing that the worst-case scenario is actually possible and can be prevented.
