Tag Archives | training & outreach

County Promotes More Precise Storm Surge Maps

A Florida county has released new storm surge maps, and they’re giving locals a more precise idea of their risks of being hit by the storm surge associated with a hurricane. Tampa Bay Online has the whole story. As the article reports, Hillsborough County has based the maps on revised models from the National Hurricane […]

Introducing StormSmart Connect

After months of testing, we’re extremely excited to announce the release of the newest part of the StormSmart Coasts Network: StormSmart Connect. We built StormSmart Connect to help make it easier for coastal decision makers work together. On StormSmart Connect, you can: Find other people in your profession from around the country (at last count […]

When Life Gives You Lemons: Galveston Turns Storm Damage Into Art

The City of Galveston (Texas) has taken a novel approach to cleaning up some of the 40,000 stumps left over from Hurricane Ike’s 2008 visit: carving them into sculptures. So far about 20 of them are serving as tourist attractions (and hopefully reminders of the storm’s devastation). UPDATE: Speaking of devastation, the Chronicle is reporting […]

High Tech (and generally free) Tools for Disaster Preparation

Mashable has written a short article outlining some of the many ways that people can take advantage of the technology they already own (computers, smart-phones, etc) to help prepare themselves for natural disasters. Some of the ideas: Using Google My Maps to create evacuation maps (see video below for an intro on how to do […]

Disaster‐Resilient Homes Webinar Series [EVENT]

The Resilient Home Program has just announced a new (free) webinar series on resilient homes. The first two webinars are co‐sponsored by FEMA and will be: Home Evaluation after Storms and Floods March 9, 2010 10:00 AM to 11:30 AM (Eastern) Presented by Bill Coulbourne, Director of Wind and Flood Mitigation Applied Technology Council (ATC) […]

Top 10 Reasons to Buy Flood Insurance NOW

While this list was written by FEMA for the general public, most of it applies to your municipal properties, too (and it’s not a bad outreach tool, either). The Top Ten Reasons to Buy Flood Insurance Now Spring flooding is almost here and there is a 30-day waiting period before coverage begins. Coverage is relatively […]

Risk Communication: Best Practices

The folks over at the NOAA Coastal Services Center recently released a two-page summary of risk communication specifically for those working in coastal hazards. In addition to explaining the concept of risk and why our behavior in the face of risk is so complicated, it provides six best practices for those trying to communicate risk. […]

New Levee Outreach

The brainy folks over at the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) have released a little handy outreach booklet designed to help folks living behind levees understand their risks. It’s called, appropriately, So, You Live Behind a Levee! The 28-page booklet answers such questions as: What does it mean to live behind a levee? Are […]