Above: map by Alert Systems Group
This map shows the risks of four types of natural disasters across the 48 contiguous states — earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, and tornados. It appears that the only state completely devoid of any of the four is Michigan, while portions of some states in the midwest and the central U.S. have little risk of these events.
Our readers will probably notice that at least a couple of categories of disasters are missing; notably wildfires and extreme winter weather. Plugging those in (after seeing the news Tuesday about snow on top of ice paralyzing areas in the south) that would leave …. what do you think? A few areas in New Mexico and Southwest Texas? But of course fires are not unheard of there.
Doubt this research is peer reviewed.
I’m not sure of the accuracy of this graph, haha. Tornadoes happen regularly in the SE-sometimes referred to as the Dixie alley. Statistically speaking, SE tornadoes are generally more apt to be deadly.
Much of our disasters are being made in Washington D.C.
Say ya to da UP, eh?!
Grew up in Michigan. Why did we have tornado drills in school? See http://michiganradio.org/post/top-10-tornado-counties-michigan
And Michigan got hit with a meteor last nite too!
That messed up the statistics!
Just checked the weather today in Michigan. Nooo thanks! 😀
But here’s something to consider: the typical way these sorts of charts are presented to the public. A flood for example is very localized. A flood along one river in say, Colorado doesn’t affect anywhere except a tightly-defined place. No where else in the state would anyone even know about it without the help of telephones. Usually the same places have recurring events, so it’ll probably be in the same place, time after time. So, everyone stays clear of it for permanent communities (visiting – fine). But the entire state gets the ‘color’ code, giving the impression that the entire state is at risk. It’s a visual grab, but not really helpful to the public.
The same problem for the public trying to figure out risks is done for disease outbreaks. The 2015-2015 Ebola epidemic is an example. Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia together had thousands of cases, so of course on the globe map, they were warning highlighted red as ‘ebola’ country. But Senegal had exactly one case, a man from Guinea who crossed over the border (lied) paid for a ride to the hospital, actually very sensibly looking for good medical care. He survived (evidently he was correct about the medical care) and was then sternly escorted back to the border and kicked out. But to look at the ‘ebola map’, the entire country was highlighted in red exactly the same as the countries that were the centers of the outbreak with thousands of cases, and stayed that way long after the one lone case had come and gone.
It cost Senegal a lot of tourism income loss at the time and even for the year after the epidemic ended because people saw the warning map, thought ebola was everywhere in the country and were afraid to go there. A more informative map would have showed a teeny-tiny red dot at the city hospital for ten days, then the same teeny-tiny dot steadily moving to the border along the main road for a day before disappearing at the border post. Bye-bye! So, always worth reading the fine print on generalized map presentations. 🙂
These folks must be spending too much time in their shelter. Tornados not uncommon in MI especially southern MI. Among others, In 1981 much of downtown Kalamazoo was heavily damaged by a tornado.