Natural disasters

WILDFIRESWho Pays for Wildfire Damage? In the West, Utilities Are Shifting the Risk to Customers
By Will Peischel
Utah laws cap wildfire damages and let utilities pass the cost onto customers. Utility lobbyists are pushing the model in other states.
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FLOODSNew AI Flood Model Gives Water Managers Up-to-the-Minute Decision-Making Tool
By Angela Nicoletti
The predictive model is capable of crunching real-time data to address dangerous situations, according to new research
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FLOODSElon Musk Pushed Back on Our Reporting on His Houston Tunnels Plan. Experts Say His Comments Are Misleading.
By Yilun Cheng, Houston Chronicle
Elon Musk is taking issue with a recent investition by the Houston Chronicle and The Texas Newsroom that raised questions about a flood tunnel project he’s pitching to address Houston’s chronic flooding woes. But experts said his response, which he did not explain to the newsrooms, isn’t supported by facts or data.
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FLOODSA Texas Congressman Is Quietly Helping Elon Musk Pitch a $760M Plan to Build Tunnels Under Houston to Ease Flooding
By Lauren McGaughy, The Texas Newsroom and Yilun Cheng, Houston Chronicle
Experts in Houston have been studying the idea of building massive tunnels to divert floodwaters. Musk’s company wants a piece of the project.
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DISASTERSTwo Decades Later, the Experience of Katrina Continues to Shape How the Nation Prepares for and Responds to Disasters
By Lauren Alexander Augustine
Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath exposed profound gaps in multiple systems, including flood protection, emergency response, health care, and housing. It marked a turning point in the way we understand the impacts of natural disasters.
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DISASTER RESPONSEHow AI Is Changing Our Approach to Disasters
By Patrick S. Roberts
Disaster losses are rising, and the stakes are high for reducing risk. Artificial intelligence (AI) promises new ways to spot danger sooner, coordinate relief more quickly, and save lives and property. But AI doesn’t just drop neatly into a command center.
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TSUNAMI WARNINGSLLNL Scientists Explore Real-Time Tsunami Warning System on World’s Fastest Supercomputer
Scientists have helped develop an advanced, real-time tsunami forecasting system that could dramatically improve early warning capabilities for coastal communities near earthquake zones.
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FOOD SECURITYThe Rising Threat to New York City’s Food System
By Ilana Schwartz
The Hunts Point Food Distribution Center, the largest of its kind in the country, serves as the penultimate stop for 4.5 billion pounds of food that feed the city and surrounding areas each year. Losing access to that hub could be catastrophic for a city that produces almost none of its own food.
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HURRICANE KATRINA: 20 YEARS ONHurricane Katrina: 3 Painful Lessons for Emergency Management Are Increasingly Important 20 Years Later
By Eric Kevin Stern
Hurricane Katrina looms large in the history of American emergency management, both for what went wrong as the disaster unfolded and for the policy changes it triggered. As efforts to reform –and possibly rebalance –the U.S. emergency management system continue, it is essential to remember and heed the costly lessons of Hurricane Katrina.
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HURRICANE KATRINA: 20 YEARS ON20 Years After Katrina, New Orleans’ Levees Are Sinking and Short on Money
By Jake Bittle
The city’s $14 billion flood system faces new threats from climate change, land subsidence, and Trump budget cuts.
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WILDFIRESHuman-Caused Climate Change Is Expanding California’s Destructive Fire Seasons
By Jason Islas
Human-caused climate change was responsible for a six-to-46-day earlier start to fire season in California between 1992 and 2020, increasing the period in which large swaths of the state were susceptible to destructive burning. As climate warming trends continue, California’s fire seasons likely will continue to get longer and potentially more destructive.
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CASCADING HAZARDSBetter Predicting and Understanding Cascading Land Surface Hazards
When an extreme weather event occurs, the probability or risk of other events can often increase, leading to what researchers call “cascading” hazards. Such occurrences leave lasting imprints on the landscape that can prime the Earth’s surface for subsequent events.
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WILDEFIRESAI-powered Tool Developed for Near Real-Time, Large-Scale Wildfire Fuel Mapping
Researchers have developed a new system that could help enhance nationwide wildfire preparedness by combining satellite imagery with artificial intelligence to rapidly and accurately identify wildfire fuel sources.
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WATER SECURITYGroundwater Is Drying Out, Heating Up, and Causing Sea Level Rise
By Rebecca Egan McCarthy
Overuse has created zones of “mega-drying” around the world —and caused more sea level rise than Greenland’s ice sheet.
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PLANETARY SECUITYAsteroid Hunting Using Heliostats?
Most planetary defense efforts use observatory-grade telescopes to produce images of the stars. Within those images, computational methods identify streaks, which are asteroids. This process is precise but time-consuming, and building new observatories is expensive. A Researcher says that heliostats, which typically turn solar energy into electricity, could help find asteroids at night. Most planetary defense efforts use observatory-grade telescopes to produce images of the stars. Within those images, computational methods identify streaks, which are asteroids. This process is precise but time-consuming, and building new observatories is expensive. A Researcher says that heliostats, which typically turn solar energy into electricity, could help find asteroids at night.
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