Recent changes in vulnerability and responses of economic and human systems to major extreme weather hazards in the United States

Abstract

Reducing the impacts and risk of weather hazards requires better knowledge of the regions that are most affected in terms of economic damage, fatality and injury. While understanding of weather hazards has greatly improved, regional vulnerability to weather hazards of various types has not been well assessed in the United States. Through a compilation of event-based records of eight types of weather hazards for 1996–2016 at the national, regional and state levels, our analysis shows large differences in the change trends in economic damage, fatality and injury caused by drought, coastal flood, hail and wildfire, demonstrating the inconsistent responses of economic and human systems to weather hazards of various types at the state level. Despite a general increase in annual occurrences, spatial analysis shows that vulnerability to tornado and hail has decreased significantly in most of the country. Our results have great implications for adaptation and mitigation strategies, through identifying the vulnerable regions and types of hazards that require more urgent efforts for reducing economic and human losses. It is, however, important to keep in mind that the results may depend on the records, indicators and time periods used for the analysis.

Keywords

• weather extremes
• economic damage
• human casualty
• hazard
• vulnerability