NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) has updated its 2024 Billion-dollar disaster analysis. In 2024, there were 27 individual weather and climate disasters with at least $1 billion in damages, trailing only the record-setting 28 events analyzed in 2023. These disasters caused at least 568 direct or indirect fatalities, which is the eighth-highest for these billion-dollar disasters over the last 45 years (1980-2024). The cost was approximately $182.7 billion.

This total places 2024 as the fourth-costliest on record, trailing 2017 ($395.9 billion), 2005 ($268.5 billion) and 2022 ($183.6 billion). Adding the 27 events of 2024 to the record that begins in 1980, the U.S. has sustained 403 weather and climate disasters for which the individual damage costs reached or exceeded $1 billion. The cumulative cost for these 403 events exceeds $2.915 trillion.

Before presenting the analysis of 2024, here are a few notes for additional context. This research is a quantification of the weather and climate disasters that in 2024 led to more than $1 billion in collective damages for each event, and all prior-year cost estimates are adjusted for inflation to 2024 dollars using the Consumer Price Index. Additionally, these cost totals for 2024 are based on analysis through January 10th, 2025, and may rise an additional several billion dollars, as new data become available. This analysis is conservative, as it excludes events with less than $1 billion in damages in 2024 dollars. However, it does include 57 events since 1980 that were originally below the billion-dollar threshold but are now above $1 billion in 2024 dollars.

The billion-dollar disasters of 2024 came from multiple categories:

2 winter storm/cold wave events (across the Northwest and central/southern U.S. in mid-January).

1 wildfire event (the South Fork Fire in New Mexico that destroyed many homes, vehicles, businesses and other infrastructure).

1 drought and heat wave event (causing impacts across the southern, eastern and northwestern U.S.).

1 flooding event (the Upper Midwest Flooding in mid-June across several states).

6 tornado outbreaks (across the central and southeastern U.S.).

5 tropical cyclones (Beryl, Debby, Francine, Helene and Milton – the final two were the costliest U.S. disasters of 2024).

11 severe weather/hail events (across many parts of the country).

In 2024, the United States experienced 27 separate weather or climate disasters that each resulted in at least $1 billion in damages. NOAA map by NCEI.

Costliest U.S. billion-dollar disasters of 2024

Among the many weather and climate-related disasters to affect the U.S. in 2024, the following caused the most damaging impacts and heavily impacted many communities.

Hurricane Helene, September 24-29: 219 deaths, $79.6 billion

Category 4 Hurricane Helene with 140 mph sustained winds was the strongest hurricane on record to strike the Big Bend region of Florida having made landfall near Perry, Florida on September 26. Helene was the third hurricane to hit the Big Bend region in just over a year. It caused up to 15 feet of storm surge along the Big Bend coast and six feet of surge as far south as St. Petersburg. It also caused billions of dollars in damage to Georgia’s agriculture sector. Helene’s most severe impacts were from the historic rainfall (up to 30+ inches) and flooding across much of western North Carolina.

This photo from September 29, 2024, shows a damaged railroad bridge and mud-covered streets in Asheville, North Carolina, following flooding on the Swannanoa River during Hurricane Helene. Photo by Adam B. Smith.

This flooding eclipsed the region’s previous worst flood from 1916. Asheville and many surrounding cities and communities were heavily impacted. Southwestern Virginia and extreme eastern Tennessee were also heavily impacted. Damage came in many forms. Landslides, debris flows, and historic levels of flooding inundated and destroyed homes, businesses, parks, hospitals, the electrical, cellular and water system infrastructure, and damaged thousands of roads, highways and bridges, as examples. Additional information is currently being assembled that summarizes the vast scope of damage produced by Helene. Helene was the deadliest Atlantic hurricane since Maria (2017), and the deadliest to strike the U.S. mainland since Katrina (2005).

Between September 23 and 28, the highest 3-day rainfall totals across the higher elevations of the southern Appalachian Mountains were so extreme that the statistical chances of them being exceeded in an any given year were 1 in 1,000 (black areas). Statistically, this is the same as saying that averaged over long periods of time, a 3-day rainfall event so extreme would only occur on average (not literally!) once every 1,000 years. NOAA Climate.gov graphic, adapted from original by NOAA’s National Weather Service.

Hurricane Milton, October 9-10: 32 deaths, $34.3 billion

Category 3 Hurricane Milton with 120 mph sustained winds made landfall near Siesta Key, Florida on October 9. A storm surge of 5 to 10 feet caused damage from Naples to Charlotte Harbor. Milton’s track to the south of Tampa Bay lessened storm surge impacts on the densely populated Tampa metro region.

A Florida Fish and Wildlife officer helps to evacuate a flooded Florida neighborhood in the aftermath of Hurricane Milton on October 10, 2024. Florida Fish and Wildlife photo from their Flickr account. Image has been cropped and brightened. Used under a Creative Commons license.

Dozens of tornadoes were also spawned from Milton, damaging homes, businesses, vehicles and other infrastructure across southern Florida. Milton underwent rapid intensification into a Category 5 hurricane with 180 mph sustained winds and a 897 mb central pressure reading. An environment of enhanced wind shear the day prior to landfall reduced Milton’s peak wind potential.

Hurricane Beryl, July 8: 46 deaths, $7.2 billion

GOES-16 satellite imagery of Hurricane Beryl on July 1, 2024, as it rapidly intensified in the Caribbean Sea. Hours after this image was taken, Beryl strengthened into a catastrophic Category 5 hurricane. Credit: CSU/CIRA & NOAA

Category 1 Hurricane Beryl made landfall in Texas on July 8, producing widespread high wind damage, as the storm was re-strengthening at landfall. One significant impact was power outages that impacted millions of people for days. Beryl also produced more than 50 tornadoes across eastern Texas, western Louisiana and southern Arkansas. On July 1, Beryl became the earliest Category 5 hurricane and the second Category 5 on record during the month of July in the Atlantic Ocean.

Central, southern & southeast tornado outbreak, May 6-9: 3 deaths, $6.6 billion

An outbreak producing more than 165 tornadoes developed across many central, southern and southeastern states. The states most affected include Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida. This multi-day tornado outbreak produced at least 61 EF-0, 79 EF-1, 13 EF-2, three EF-3, one EF-4 tornado and dozens of EF-U (unknown/unrated) tornadoes, causing widespread damage to homes, businesses, vehicles, agriculture and other infrastructure. The towns of Barnsdall and Bartlesville, Oklahoma, were impacted by an EF-4 tornado that caused extensive damage.

2024 costs in historical context

The year 2024 (red line) is the 14th-consecutive year (2011-2024) in which 10 or more separate billion-dollar disaster events have impacted the U.S. The 1980–2023 annual average (black line) is 9.0 events; the annual average for the most recent 5 years (2020–2024) is 23.0 events.

Month-by-month accumulation of billion-dollar disasters for each year on record. The colored lines represent the top 6 years for most billion-dollar disasters. The dark gray line shows the average. All other years are colored light gray. NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

Over the last ten years (2015-2024), the U.S. has been impacted by 190 separate billion-dollar disasters that have killed more than 6,300 people (direct and indirect fatalities) and cost ~$1.4 trillion in damage. The U.S. mainland has been impacted by landfalling Category 4 or 5 hurricanes in six of the last eight years, including Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, Maria, Michael, Laura, Ida, Ian and Helene. The impacts from Hurricanes Helene and Milton were particularly destructive, causing more than $100 billion in combined damage across Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia over a two-week period from late-September into early October.

Month-by-month accumulation of estimated costs of each year’s billion-dollar disasters, with colored lines showing 2024 (red) and the other top-10 costliest years. Other years are light gray. 2024 finished the year in fourth place for annual costs. Screenshot from the NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

The total cost of U.S. billion-dollar disasters over the last 5 years (2020-2024) is $746.7 billion, with a 5-year annual cost average of $149.3 billion. This 5-year cost average is more than double the 45-year (1980-2024) annual cost average of $64.8 billion for all of the billion-dollar disaster events.

Increasing trend of disasters: exposure, vulnerability, and influence of climate change

It is clear that the number of billion-dollars disasters and their total costs have risen since 1980. Even though the analysis adjusts for inflation, none of the highest years are from before 2000. The graph below shows it more clearly.

The history of billion-dollar disasters in the United States each year from 1980 to 2024, showing event type (colors), frequency (left-hand vertical axis), and cost (right-hand vertical axis) adjusted for inflation to 2024 dollars. NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

Losses from the billion-dollar disasters tracked by NCEI have averaged $140 billion per year over the last decade (NCEI, 2025). 2017 was the costliest year, exceeding $300 billion—proportional to about 25% of the $1.3 trillion building value put in place that year (Multi-Hazard Mitigation Council, 2019, full report).

The cost per capita (see right y-axis in chart below) has also remained at a high level for the U.S. as a whole since 2017 when compared to previous years even after adjusting for CPI-inflation. This indicates that the costs of the billion-dollar disasters are rising more sharply than general population growth. The chart shows the 5-year-average disaster cost per capita was about $150 (inflation-adjusted) per U.S. resident in the early-2000s. The 5-year average disaster cost per capita then increased above $400 per person in the late 2010s and has remained at a high level in recent years.

The history of billion-dollar disasters in the United States each year from 1980 to 2024, showing event type (colors), frequency (left-hand vertical axis), and total cost (right-hand vertical axis) adjusted for inflation using the Consumer Price Index. NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

There are several potential explanations for these trends, including increases in exposure (i.e., more assets at risk); increases in vulnerability (i.e., the amount of damage a hazard of given intensity, such as high winds, can cause at a location); and increases in the frequency and intensity of some types of extreme events due to human-caused climate change (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Compounding Disasters in Gulf Coast Communities 2020-2021: Impacts, Findings, and Lessons (2024); Multi-Hazard Mitigation Council. Natural Hazard Mitigation Saves (2019); Fifth U.S. National Climate Assessment (2023).

A major driver of increased costs of extreme weather is the increase in population and material wealth over the last several decades. For example, in an analysis of recent disasters in the Gulf of Mexico region, the National Academies concluded, “Exposure to extreme weather and climate hazards in the Gulf of Mexico state region is increasing as a result of population growth and increased construction of public and private development in hazard-prone areas” (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Compounding Disasters in Gulf Coast Communities 2020-2021: Impacts, Findings, and Lessons, 2024).

Much of this growth and property development has continued in high-risk areas like coasts, the fire-prone wildland-urban interface in the West, and river floodplains. Increased building and population growth in these high-risk areas mean that more people and property are at risk and so also contribute to larger losses (CBO report “Climate Change, Disaster Risk, and Homeowner’s Insurance,” 2024). Areas where building codes are insufficient for reducing damage from extreme events are especially vulnerable to more expensive extreme weather.

Population growth and how and where we build play a big role in the increasing number and costs of billion-dollar disasters. But we also know from extreme event attribution research that human-caused climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of certain types of extreme weather that lead to billion-dollar disasters—most notably the rise in vulnerability to drought, lengthening wildfire seasons in the Western states, and the potential for extremely heavy rainfall becoming more common in the eastern states. Sea level rise is worsening hurricane storm surge flooding. (Read more about changes in climate and weather extremes in the Fifth U.S. National Climate Assessment (2023) . Given those trends, it’s likely that human-caused climate change is having some level of influence on the rising costs of billion-dollar disasters.

Some mix of these factors is likely the reason that the 2010s decade was far costlier in the Billion-Dollar Disaster data set than the 2000s, 1990s, or 1980s, even when adjusted for inflation to current dollars). See the table below.

This table shows summary statistics of billion-dollar disasters by decade and by latest 1, 3-, and 5-year periods. Costs over the last complete decade, the 5-year average, and the 3-year average are all higher than the costs of the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s. Screenshot from NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

1980-2024 U.S. costs and fatalities by disaster type

Tropical cyclones caused the most damage from 1980 to 2024 ($1,543.2 billion) and had the highest average event cost ($23.0 billion per event). Severe storms ($514.3 billion), drought ($367.5 billion), and inland flooding ($203.0 billion) also caused considerable damage. Severe storms account for the highest number of billion-dollar disaster events (203), but they have the lowest average event cost ($2.5 billion), which is consistent with their localized nature. Tropical cyclones and flooding represent the second and third most frequent event types (67 and 45), respectively. Tropical cyclones are responsible for the highest number of deaths (7,211), followed by drought/heatwave events (4,658) and severe storms (2,145).

This table shows the breakdown, by hazard type, of the 403 billion-dollar weather and climate disasters assessed since 1980. Severe storms are far and away the most frequent type of billion-dollar disaster. Screenshot from the NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

Disasters by region

The South, Central, and Southeast regions of the United States, including the Caribbean U.S. territories, have suffered the highest cumulative damage costs, reflecting the severity and widespread vulnerability of those regions to a variety of weather and climate events.

This map depicts the total estimated cost borne by each state from billion-dollar weather and climate events from 1980-2024. Screenshot from NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

Florida leads the U.S. in total cumulative costs (~$450 billion) from billion-dollar disasters since 1980 largely due to the impact of hurricanes. Texas is the second-leading state in total costs since 1980 (~$436 billion), but it has been affected by the highest number of billion-dollar disasters since 1980. Louisiana’s total costs are the 3rd highest (~$314 billion) from billion-dollar disasters.

Map of costs of billion-dollar disasters per 1 million residents by state during 2024. Screenshot from NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

Billion-dollar disasters by month

The 45-year climatology of U.S. billion-dollar disasters offers a view of risk from extreme events, which are often seasonal in nature. For example, during the spring months (March-May) severe storms (green blocks), including tornadoes, hail, and high winds, often occur in many Central and Southeast states, but they taper off in the second half of the year.

The monthly climatology of U.S. billion-dollar weather and climate disasters from 1980 to 2024, showing which months have the greater frequency of disasters (height of bar) and which types of events (colors) are most likely to occur in a given month. Screenshot from NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

During the spring months there is also greater potential for major river flooding (i.e., deep blue events in chart above). U.S. springtime flooding from snowmelt and/or heavy rainfall is a persistent hazard that affects many towns and agriculture regions within the Missouri and Mississippi River basins, among others. During the fall season, Gulf and Atlantic coast states must be vigilant about hurricane season particularly during August and September (i.e., yellow events in chart above).

There were 26 separate billion-dollar, non-hurricane flood events during the last 15 years (2010-2024). There were only 19 separate billion-dollar, non-hurricane flood events during the preceding 30 years (1980s, 1990s and 2000s) – all CPI-adjusted to 2024 dollars. The growth in property exposure in the floodplains is a big driver in losses. In addition, a warming atmosphere holds more water vapor and has increased potential to produce heavy rainfall / flooding. (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Compounding Disasters in Gulf Coast Communities 2020-2021: Impacts, Findings, and Lessons (2024)).

Also, the peak of the Western U.S. wildfire season occurs during the fall months of September, October and November (i.e., orange events in chart above). California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana and Colorado often experience enhanced wildfire risk and related poor air quality for weeks to months.

Western wildfire damage during the 2017-2021 period was historic, exceeding $90 billion in 2024 dollars compared to only $58 billion in combined damage for the other 18 BDD wildfire events since 1980. The multi-year, “D4-exceptional” Western drought (2014-2016) and the continual growth of the built environment along the wildland-urban interface likely contributed to the catastrophic wildfires of the 2017-2021. 17 of the 20 largest California wildfires by acreage and 18 of the 20 most destructive wildfires by the number of buildings destroyed have occurred since the year 2000 (Cal-Fire stats, 2025).

In total, each region of the U.S. faces a unique combination of recurring hazards, as billion-dollar disaster events have affected every state since 1980. The combined historical risk of U.S. severe storms and river flooding events places the spring and summer seasons in the high-risk category for simultaneous extreme weather and climate events, while hurricanes, wildfires and drought dominate the fall season.

Compound extremes

The increase in disasters creates ‘compound extremes’ (e.g., billion-dollar disaster events that occur at the same time or in sequence), which are also an increasing problem for recovery. As noted in the recent Fifth National Climate Assessment (2023) , “climate change is also increasing the risk of multiple extremes occurring simultaneously in different locations that are connected by complex human and natural systems.” For instance, simultaneous megafires across multiple western states and back-to-back Atlantic hurricanes in 2020, 2022 and 2024 or numerous tornado outbreaks can create high demand on local, state and federal emergency response resources.

This graph shows the percent frequency of a given month having at least one billion-dollar disaster (light pink bars), 2 or more events (medium pink bars), 3 or more (red), 4 or more (darker red), or 5 or more (darkest red). Billion-dollar weather and climate disasters occur in all months, but the spring and summer (March–Aug) are the time when multiple, concurrent disasters are likely. A second maximum occurs in the Fall driven by tropical cyclones. Screenshot from the NOAA NCEI Billion-dollar Disasters webpage.

Writing about these challenges for the Gulf region, the National Academies concluded (full report):

Hurricane season starts June 1, and above-average activity is predicted. But America’s premier agencies for protecting lives and property from these destructive storms – the National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration, or NOAA, and the Federal Emergency Management Association, or FEMA – are in unprecedented disarray. The chaos will likely harm hurricane forecast accuracy in 2025, as well as disaster preparation and response.

See where the National Weather Service can no longer monitor conditions around the clock, because of DOGE-led staffing cuts: — Scott Dance (@byscottdance.com) 2025-05-16T15:46:49.651Z

NOAA reeling from huge staffing losses

Massive staffing losses at NOAA from firings of probationary employees, DOGE buyouts, and early retirements have left at least eight of the 122 National Weather Service offices unable to operate around the clock. Because of the loss of staff, regular twice-per-day upper air balloon soundings – which are typically the most important ingredient in making reliable model weather forecasts (Fig. 1) – have been lost from 18% of the nation’s upper air stations. Some locations have been reduced to once-per-day launches, and a number are doing no launches at all. The Washington Post reports that since March 20, 17% of all U.S. balloon launches that should have occurred have not, mostly because of NOAA staffing losses.

The greatest data loss is in the Midwest U.S., which will cause significantly degraded forecasts of hurricanes making landfall along the U.S. Gulf and Atlantic coasts in some situations. It is difficult to quantify the exact degradation, since the researchers needed to perform the “data denial” studies that could inform us have been laid off or are stretched too thin to do the research needed.

While we can expect that the National Hurricane Center will order special balloon launches in the case of a landfalling hurricane, it is questionable whether local National Weather Service offices will have the staff to comply. (And note that balloon launches are often canceled for unanticipated reasons, such as maintenance issues, thunderstorms nearby making it unsafe to do the launches, etc.) Because of the loss of balloon data in 2025, the size of the NHC cone will likely be too small in some situations, giving people overconfidence in the accuracy of hurricane forecasts. Such overconfidence can result in delayed evacuation decisions and failure to take adequate measures to protect lives and property.

Figure 1. Impact of various observations on 24-hour forecast accuracy of NASA’s GEOS-FP weather forecast model over the past year. (Image credit: NASA Global Modeling and Assimilation Office)

Moreover, the loss of National Weather Service staff will likely affect local hurricane forecasts and warnings issued by some NWS offices serving hurricane-prone coasts. The situation is particularly acute in Houston, where the office’s website lists 11 vacancies out of a staff of 25 – a 44% understaffing.

As Alan Gerard wrote in April in his excellent Balanced Weather Substack feed, “The NWS office in Houston – one of the largest metropolitan areas in the country with tremendous vulnerability to hazardous weather – will soon be without any permanent management staff: Their meteorologist-in-charge, warning coordination meteorologist, science and operations officer, and electronics system analyst will all be retired by the end of April. While I have no doubt that remaining NWS leadership will do what they can to mitigate the impacts of this situation, there is clearly nothing ‘strategic’ about leaving this NWS office in particular without any permanent managerial staff as we approach hurricane season.”

A number of NWS offices that serve coastal areas impacted by hurricanes have staff listings that show their current number of vacancies. As of May 28, 2025, here is the level of understaffing that was listed at each office. (Actual staffing shortages may differ from the numbers listed on the websites, particularly at offices so understaffed that they don’t have time to update their webpages.)

Houston, Texas: 44% understaffed (11 of 25 positions vacant)

Miami, Florida: 25% understaffed (six of 24 positions)

Key West, Florida: 19% understaffed (four of 21 positions)

Tampa Bay, Florida: 29% understaffed (seven of 24 positions, including their meteorologist-in-charge)

Jacksonville, Florida: 9% understaffed (two of 23 positions, which happen to be two of the top three leadership positions)

Charleston, South Carolina: 22% understaffed (five of 22 positions)

Wilmington, North Carolina: 21% understaffed (five of 24 positions)

Newport, North Carolina: 14% understaffed (three of 22 positions)

Wakefield, Virginia: 0% understaffed (Zero of 22 positions)

Boston, Massachusetts: 19% understaffed (five of 26 positions)

New Orleans, Louisiana: no general staff info given, but one leadership position was unfilled: Science & Operations Officer

Lake Charles, Louisiana: 15% understaffed (three of 20 positions, reported by Washington Post)

Corpus Christi, Texas: 11% understaffed (two of 19 positions)

Brownsville, Texas: 9% understaffed (two of 23 positions)

San Juan, Puerto Rico: 21% understaffed (five of 24 positions)

Honolulu, Hawaii: 10% understaffed (three of 29 positions)

Staff at regional NWS offices are also suffering a serious loss of leadership. Three of seven of the top positions are unfilled for the Southern Region, as well as three of six top positions for the Western Region. Fortunately, the National Hurricane Center is faring better than many NWS offices: a staff listing shows just 4% understaffing (3 vacancies out of 73 positions) – fewer vacancies than were listed in September 2024.

A recent effort by NWS seeks to fill 155 “critical” vacancies at particularly understaffed offices through transfers from other offices. This would be an exercise in “robbing Peter to pay Paul” since the total number of vacancies in the NWS would remain the same.

FEMA unprepared for hurricane season

When Hurricanes Helene and Milton – both made more destructive by climate change – devastated the Southeast last fall, workers at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, oversaw the government’s effort to rescue survivors and aid the recovery. FEMA has been key, too, in bolstering the country’s long-term resilience efforts, such as elevating flood-prone homes and installing drainage works.

But according to a May 15 report from CNN, an internal agency review prepared at the direction of new acting FEMA Administrator David Richardson said, “As FEMA transforms to a smaller footprint, the intent for this hurricane season is not well understood. Thus FEMA is not ready.”

According to the CNN story, FEMA “has lost roughly 30% of its full-time staff to layoffs and DOGE buyouts, including some of its most experienced and knowledgeable senior leadership.” Furthermore, Trump officials are discussing sharply raising the threshold for states to qualify for federal disaster assistance, and both Trump and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have advocated drastically shrinking FEMA or eliminating it.

Losing 10-30% of the agency is very bad, don’t get me wrong, but it is arguably more critical to understand who is leaving. The drain of people who have EM experience in high level positions could single handedly make FEMA dead in the water for future responses.www.cnn.com/2025/05/22/p… — Dr. Samantha Montano (@samlmontano.bsky.social) 2025-05-22T22:43:21.063Z

On May 21, CBS reported that acting FEMA administrator David Richardson – who has no emergency management experience – rescinded the agency’s strategic plan, a policy document that forms FEMA’s “organizational backbone.”

Targeted for elimination was FEMA’s Office of Resilience Strategy, which “exists to figure out how to maximize efficacy of publicly spent money on projects that build a resilient infrastructure that can withstand disaster events,” the report quoted one FEMA official as saying. “Without that guiding star, FEMA will operate as triage instead of actually trying to mitigate future damage before it happens.” The official compared its removal to “people relying solely on emergency rooms for health care rather than also getting preventative care.”

SCOOP: Less than two weeks before the start of hurricane season, the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) rescinded the agency’s strategic plan, which includes a document that guides agency priorities when responding to disasters, WIRED has learned. — WIRED (@wired.com) 2025-05-21T19:47:27.483Z

The chaos at FEMA could result in slower disaster responses, longer waits for payouts, and reduced implementation of resilience efforts, ultimately increasing damage from climate change-enhanced extreme weather. As of April 1, there was already an “unusual” backlog of requests for disaster declarations, the Washington Post reported. In addition, firings could hamper efforts to update the agency’s significantly outdated flood maps, which are critical for determining flood risk and insurance rates.

Compounding the diminishment of FEMA’s capability for the upcoming hurricane season are the massive cuts to AmeriCorps, which has in the past provided key disaster recovery services. According to reporting from Grist, in April, “AmeriCorps placed 85 percent of its 500 staff on leave and canceled nearly $400 million in grants out of a $1 billion budget. The move effectively ended the service of an estimated 32,000 AmeriCorps workers across the country.”

After disasters, AmeriCorps was everywhere. What happens when it’s gone?Elon Musk’s DOGE has gutted the 30-year-old national service agency.grist.org/extreme-weat…#Musk #DOGE #Weather #Disaster #Climate #AmeriCorps — Grist (@grist.org) 2025-05-15T18:09:48.199Z

Bottom line: With climate change already making the strongest hurricanes stronger, and with the U.S. now in the midst of a historic period of landfalls from high-end Cat 4 and Cat 5 hurricanes, critical deficiencies at NOAA and FEMA for the upcoming hurricane season represent a serious risk to lives and property.

Bob Henson contributed to this post.

Join me Friday night at 8:45 pm EDT for my talk, “Hunting Hugo: The Hurricane Hunters’ Wildest Ride”. I’ll talk about my final flight with the Hurricane Hunters in 1989, which was nearly my final flight in a more permanent sense! — Dr. Jeff Masters (@drjeffmasters.bsky.social) 2025-05-28T14:42:29.964Z

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Shelter from the Storm

The era of extreme weather is upon us. How do we adapt to this new normal?

urricane Helene raged across the southeastern United States in late September 2024, causing catastrophic flooding and ravaging communities from Florida’s Tampa Bay all the way inland to North Carolina’s Appalachian mountain towns. The Category 4 storm killed at least 219 people and inflicted more than $63 billion in damages.

Less than two weeks later, Hurricane Milton intensified into a Category 5 storm in the Gulf of Mexico. It hit the west coast of Florida as a slightly weakened Category 3, killing more than 30 people and causing an estimated $34 billion in damages.

The numbers do not lie. More Category 4 and 5 hurricanes hit the U.S. from 2017 to 2021 than from 1963 to 2016. By 2100, the number of major hurricanes, including a new breed of “ultra-intense” Category 5 storms with winds of at least 190 miles per hour, is expected to increase by 20%, according to recent studies analyzed by Time.

These are devastating predictions considering that 129 million people—nearly 40 percent of the nation’s total population—live in coastal counties.

As climate change intensifies, extreme weather events such as hurricanes, wildfires, flooding, atmospheric rivers and drought strike more frequently, leaving a trail of destruction and prompting a critical question: Now what?

Adapting to this new reality won’t be easy, especially when 51% of Americans say they have felt suspicious of the groups and people pushing for action on climate change, according to Pew Research Center. A Pew poll also reveals that only 46% of Americans believe that climate change is anthropogenic.

“Climate change can be a politicized issue,” says Kristiane Huber ’11, an environmental policy analyst focused on state-level climate adaptation and flood-preparedness policy at The Pew Charitable Trusts.

“But there is widespread agreement that disasters are impacting people more severely. There’s a growing acknowledgment that gradual changes like sea level rise are happening, leading to more frequent ‘sunny day flooding.’ The trends point to this worsening in the future, and communities are ready to engage,” says Huber, who majored in environmental studies and government and was a scholar in the Goodwin-Niering Center for the Environment at Conn, before earning a Master of Science in natural resources and the environment from the University of Michigan.

By 2050, 800 million people will live in cities where sea levels could rise by more than half a metre

Many coastal communities around the world already live with the threat from sea level rise and coastal flooding; where climate impacts can drown neighbourhoods, put people’s lives at risk and wreak economic havoc. But, if the world fails to commit to the Paris Agreement’s goal of reducing carbon emissions and limit global average temperature rise to 1.5oC, many of the world’s cities will face an extraordinary threat from rising seas and coastal flooding by mid-century. According to the new The Future We Don’t Want analysis, the total urban population at risk from sea level rise, if emissions don’t go down, could number over 800 million people, living in 570 cities, by 2050. It is therefore crucial that Paris Agreement pledges are honoured if the social and economic impacts of catastrophic climate change are to be avoided.

Estimates suggest that the global economic costs to cities, from rising seas and inland flooding, could amount to $1 trillion by mid-century. As with other climate hazards, local factors mean that cities will experience sea level rise at different paces. Cities on the east coast of the U.S., including New York City and Miami, are particularly vulnerable, along with major cities in South East Asia, such as Bangkok and Shanghai. In the U.S., east coast cities are witnessing sea level rise that is two to three times faster than the global average while cities along China’s Yellow River Delta are experiencing sea level rise of more than 22 cm (9 inches) per year. According to a 2016 report by Christian Aid; Miami, Guangzhou, and New York are the top three cities in terms of the value of assets exposed to coastal flooding between 2010 and 2070; between 2 and 3.5 trillion dollars. But it’s Kolkata, Mumbai and Dhaka that have the highest number of people at risk from coastal inundation; between 11 and 14 million.

“Hurricane Sandy had a devastating impact across the city … 44 New Yorkers lost their lives, close to 90,000 buildings were in the inundation zone, 2 million people lost power and the city sustained close to $19 billion in damages.” – Jainey Bavishi, Director of Recovery and Resiliency

Figure 1 – Cities a risk from sea level rise of 0.5 metres by 2050s [Cities projected to receive at least 0.5 metres of sea level rise by the 2050s under RCP8.5.]

Cities are at risk of coastal flooding and storm surges

Even though variations in geography leave certain cities acutely exposed to sea level rise and coastal flooding, such as low-lying delta cities in typhoon and hurricane zones, a city’s level of climate risk is intensified by socio-economic circumstances and the built environment’s shape and form. In New York City, some of the most valuable properties in the world are located in flood-prone areas at the southern tip of Manhattan and real estate valued at an estimated $129 billion lies within the city’s floodplains.

When Hurricane Sandy struck New York in 2012, coastal floods impacted an estimated 90,000 buildings in New York City alone, while 2 million people lost power, which caused extensive damage, disrupted commercial activity and costed the city over $19 billion. “The hurricane exacerbated the challenges across the city,” said Jainey Bavishi, New York City’s Director of Recovery and Resiliency, “whether it would be inadequate infrastructure, lack of affordable housing, or existing environmental hazards”. When the waters seeped in over Manhattan, metro stations were flooded and electrical substations submerged, which impacted critical services such as hospitals; several of which had to be evacuated.

While the financial scale of a storm surge impact may be unique in New York, considering the city’s property values and status as a global financial centre, many other cities are dealing with a common problem: How can a city increase its resilience to climate change while simultaneously meeting the housing demands of a rapidly growing, low-income population?

Such is the situation in Dar es Salaam, the largest city in Tanzania. An estimated 8 percent of the city already lies below sea level, which puts over 143,000 people at risk from coastal inundation. But an extremely rapid population growth of 5.3 percent a year means that unplanned informal settlements are expanding into flood-prone areas, where poor residents are highly susceptible to climate impacts. There, the residents’ vulnerability is heightened by inadequate storm water drainage, sewage and piping systems that result in public health hazards during floods.

Neighbourhoods and road infrastructure in Dar es Salaam is frequently inundated, along with river valleys that traverse the city. When it floods, transport systems are disrupted and it can take two to three hours to reach your destination, while the city centre often becomes inaccessible to public transport. Storms and heavy rainfalls furthermore damage electricity poles, which cause regular blackouts, and consequent economic knock-on effects, according to Grace Mbena, Principle Town Planner in Dar es Salaam.

The Indonesian capital Jakarta, meanwhile, flooded in 1976, 1990, 1996, 2002, 2007 and 2012 and is facing similar issues as Dar es Salaam – but at a megacity scale. In northern Jakarta, close to 90 percent of the metropolitan region already lies below sea level, and more than 60 percent of the city’s 10,6 million residents, and particularly the people who live in Kampungs – poor, informal, high-density settlements – are vulnerable to flooding. Based on the experiences and prediction, “every five or six years there are larger floods,” said Aisa Tobing, Senior Adviser, Jakarta Research Council. Jakarta is especially susceptible to sea level rise and high tides since it’s also experiencing one of the fastest land subsidence rates in the world. The digging of illegal wells is deflating the city from below, while the crushing weight of urban sprawl adds additional pressure, causing land to sink by 20 to 25 cm a year; especially in certain areas in North Jakarta.

“Based on climate adaptation research, in 2025, without improving adaptive capacity, more Kampungs will become very vulnerable to climate change.” – Aisa Tobing, Senior Adviser, Jakarta Research Council

In Jakarta, climate change, along with urban development patterns and the geographic condition of being a low-lying delta city, reinforce each other in a troublesome spiral. The result is inundated homes and a paralysed metropolitan infrastructure; along with increased health hazards due to the spread of garbage-laden and highly polluted water. Even without the runaway global warming that would occur by 2050, in the absence of emissions reductions in line with the Paris Agreement, a recent New York Times article points out that hydrologists’ estimation is that Jakarta has 10 years at hand to halt its submergence. If not, millions of residents will be displaced, much of the city’s infrastructure will be wiped out and the country’s economy severely impacted.

Keeping the waters at bay

Reducing emissions in line with the Paris Agreement would mean that the worst climate scenarios won’t come to pass, but even with limited global warming sea level rise and coastal flooding is bound to get worse.

For all the destruction that Hurricane Sandy brought with it, the climate hazard served as a poignant reminder about the city’s vulnerability – along with the economic importance of keeping New York safe. In the hurricane’s wake, the city government called upon academic experts, the private sector, and regional agencies to strengthen urban policies and plans to reduce climate risk; including impacts from sea level rise and floods. “We’re very lucky in NYC to work with an independent panel of scientists called the New York City on Climate Change (NPCC). They release projections on how climate change may impact New York City every few years and this is mandated by local law,” said Ms. Bavishi. Based on expert advice, New York City has developed a resilience strategy that aims to strengthen costal protection, safeguard critical services and infrastructure, upgrade buildings to withstand future climate impacts, and ensure neighbourhoods are safe and prepared. There was also a new city task force, that worked together with community organisations to better understand the role these organsations played in Sandy recovery efforts. According to Ms. Bavishi, the task force recommended improving coordination among government and community organisations, providing government support for local capacity building of community organizations, and increasing coordination of financial resources for organizations both in advance of, and after a disaster.

New York City is working on protecting its 520 miles of coastline, through a multi-layered approach, focusing on the most vulnerable areas first. The city has completed the Rockaway Boardwalk, which integrates costal protection as a feature, and authorities are currently advancing the final design of a project on the east side of Manhattan, where an elevated park will include a floodwall so that New Yorkers don’t lose waterfront access in one of the city’s most densely populated areas. Other broad measures include an updated building code that accounts for new flood maps and raises elevation requirements for future structures along with a novel zoning designation called “special coastal risk districts”, which limits density in areas that are most at risk.

In Dar es Salaam, the response to sea level rise and flooding has been focused on restricting construction in flood-risk areas to reduce the spread of vulnerable informal settlements. To do so, property rights in less vulnerable areas have been formalised to incentivise families to evacuate flood-prone neighbourhoods. Through regularisations, the city can provide basic infrastructure services such as water supply, storm water drainage, public toilets, waste collection points and transport links. Ensuring that communities become more resilient can be a moving target, though. Relocated households in Dar es Salaam sometimes sell their formalised properties in the upgraded, climate safe areas, and move back to their neighbourhoods of origin. Since the older neighbourhoods may be riskier but have other benefits, such as being located closer to the city centre where connections to markets, hospitals and businesses are better, explained Ms. Mbena.

And when Dar es Salaam attempted to upgrade certain at-risk areas with better storm water drainage, road infrastructure, public toilets and lighting as well as a better police presence for security, through the Community Infrastructure Upgrading Project, property values went up. This rise, in turn, fuelled urban gentrification. The experience in Dar es Salaam shows that finding solutions to climate impacts and pressing housing needs isn’t easy. It requires a continuous conversation with affected communities to better understand and meet the residents’ expressed needs.

In Jakarta, the city has sketched on metropolitan responses as well as neighbourhood measures. “We have short term plans on building a sea wall. For the long run, there are plans to relocate residents at risk” said Ms. Tobing. With assistance from the Dutch government, Jakarta has developed a city-wide climate adaptation strategy that includes a Sea Defense Wall Master Plan. Furthermore, city officials have launched the Socially Inclusive Climate Adaptation for Urban Resilience Project, a five-year effort, that costs $1.3 billion and aims to relocate close to 400,000 people from riverbanks and reservoirs through a participatory process.

“We have short term plans on building a sea wall. For the long run, there are plans to relocate residents at risk.” – Aisa Tobing, Senior Adviser, Jakarta Research Council

Other initiatives prevent the digging of illegal wells, to halt land subsistence, as well as support community-level adaptation in Kampungs. The idea is to integrate community knowledge into city-level adaptation plans, which allows Jakarta to capitalise on residents’ existing knowledge and experience of flood impacts, without having to spend additional government funds on external expertise and costly risk assessments. Through the programme Kampung Climate, Jakarta also encourages competitions between local community leaders to upgrade their green spaces in order to make their communities more resilient. The goal is for green space to make up 30 percent of the city’s land area, a share is on the rise from a low-point of 9 percent. Flooding is still commonplace, but “the time it takes for water to be absorbed and recede is much faster. Before it would take three days but now it takes a few hours,” said Ms. Tobing.

As the varying experiences and challenges in New York City, Dar es Salaam and Jakarta show, climate change and resultant sea level rise and flooding will have diverse impacts based on a city’s geography, urban development pattern, economic makeup and social structure. Despite these variations, however, the broader experience of sea level rise and flooding under business-as-usual climate scenarios will be shared by over 570 cities throughout the world, from Miami to Guangzhou to Mumbai. In cities rich and poor, dense and sprawling, hot and cold, The Future We Don’t Want research shows that unabated climate change will expose 800 million people and trillions of dollars in assets to ever harsher and more frequent climate hazards.

This content is from 2018. View the full “The Future We Don’t Want” report.

At least five people have died in the United States after a winter storm hit a large swathe of the country over the weekend, leading to mass school closures, dangerous road conditions and power cuts.

Some 60 million people are under weather alerts across 30 states. Seven of them have declared emergencies: Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, Kansas, Missouri, Kentucky and Arkansas. The National Weather Service has warned that severe thunderstorms, with the possibility of tornadoes and hail, would also take place in some regions over the next few days.

The extreme weather has been caused by the expansion of the polar vortex southwards.

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Here is a look at what exactly polar vortex is, when it causes extreme cold, and if global warming is impacting it.

What is the polar vortex?

The polar vortex is a large area of low-pressure and cold air that swirls like a wheel around both of the Earth’s polar regions. There are two types of polar vortex: tropospheric and stratospheric.

The tropospheric polar vortex occurs at the lowest layer of the atmosphere — it extends from the surface up to about 10 km to 15 km — where most weather phenomena occur.

The stratospheric polar vortex occurs at around 15 km to 50 km high. Unlike the tropospheric polar vortex, the stratospheric polar vortex disappears during the summer and is the strongest during the autumn.

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When does the polar vortex cause extreme cold?

The US, parts of Europe, and Asia experience chilly winds when the polar vortex at the North Pole weakens travel from its usual position. “As this system weakens, some of the cold, arctic air can break off and migrate south, bringing plenty of cold air with it. Areas as far south as Florida may experience arctic weather as a result,” according to a report in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) SciJinks.

That happens because when the polar vortex is strong and stable, it keeps the jet stream travelling around the planet in a circular path. The jet stream is a narrow band of strong wind in the upper levels of the atmosphere which plays a key role in keeping cold air north and warm air south.

“Without that strong low-pressure system, the jet stream does not have enough force to maintain its usual path. It becomes wavy and rambling. When high-pressure systems get in its way, a collection of cold air pushes south, along with the rest of the polar vortex system,” the report added.

Also in Explained | Rapidly warming Arctic linked to extreme cold weather in the US: What a new study says

Is climate change impacting the polar vortex?

Scientists are still researching the precise impact of climate change on the polar vortex, and if rising temperatures are making the low-pressure system buckle more frequently.

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Some researchers believe that as the poles are getting warmer at a faster rate than the rest of the Earth, the polar vortex and jet stream are becoming weaker. Warmer temperatures make it easier for the polar vortex and jet stream to get disrupted.

“It makes sense that the polar vortex tends not to be as strong due to global warming because the planet isn’t warming uniformly. It’s warming more at the pole, overall decreasing the strength of the polar vortex and the jet stream and making it more susceptible to being dislodged and sent our way,” Steven Decker, the director of the Meteorology Undergraduate Program at Rutgers University, said last February in a press statement.