Our textbook lets us know that since 1980, there have been 250 weather and climate disasters. The overall cost for these either reached or exceeded $1 billion with the total cost of all of them exceeding $1.7 trillion. Statistics have indicated that the California wildfires are 500% larger and this is due to climate change. It has also been shown that due to global warming, hurricanes have been dumping 5-10% more rain than they had in previous years, and this has caused more risk of flooding. There is a need for new technologies that improve hazard identification and risk assessment. This would need technical and financial support from FEMA and other federal agencies. I think that with climate change, its hard to determine just how catastrophic a disaster can be because the climate is forever changing which in turn, changes storms and their intensity. Because of this, it may be hard to plan for emergencies. Until the disaster occurs, it may be hard to determine and plan for what should be done.
