REDUCING RISK, BUILDING RESILIENCE

BY DANIELLE HENDRIX

Disaster preparedness is key to mitigating fallout from inclement weather and natural disasters, and it often begins with knowing the potential threats to your home. Enter HazardAware, an online tool designed to help homeowners know their risks — and what they can do to secure their homes.

Developed by a multi-institution, UCF-led team of researchers, HazardAware provides this information for 13.3 million addresses in 196 counties along the Gulf of Mexico — including all of Florida, and parts of Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana and Texas. The data takes into account historical frequency and loss patterns for various disaster events, including flooding, tornadoes, winter hazards, droughts, hurricanes, wildfires and sinkholes.

Users can input their address and receive a HazardReady score for their property. The score takes 15 potential threats into account, along with social and environmental vulnerability, community resilience, and home construction factors. This score shows how disaster-ready a home is, and estimates how much hazards could cost a homeowner each year. Users can also request an emailed custom home report or a renter and homebuyer checklist to inform their decision-making when purchasing a home.

“PEOPLE CAN MAKE MORE INFORMED DECISIONS IF THEY HAVE ACCESS TO THIS INFORMATION,” SAYS PROFESSOR CHRIS EMRICH. “WE SEE THE HOME AS THE FIRST LINE OF DEFENSE, AND IF THERE ARE THINGS THAT CAN BE DONE TO HELP PEOPLE MITIGATE THE IMPACT OF DISASTERS AND KEEP THEIR HOMES SAFE, WE WANT THEM TO KNOW ABOUT IT.”

But HazardAware’s reach also extends beyond the household, helping public service entities foster more resilient communities through updated emergency management plans and policies.

“If a community can integrate hazard mitigation information into their comprehensive land-use plans, then they’re going to be more resilient after a disaster — and it’s going to cost them less money and time to rebound faster,” says Professor Claire Connolly Knox.

As a senior planner with Seminole County’s Office of Emergency Management, Steven Lerner is using the tool to assist with informing the county’s local mitigation and resiliency plan.

“HazardAware puts some of the necessary data at our fingertips and helps us make informed decisions on how we develop our disaster mitigation plans, training and exercises”

“HazardAware puts some of the necessary data at our fingertips and helps us make informed decisions on how we develop our disaster mitigation plans, training and exercises,” Lerner says. “It allows us to gauge our level of resiliency compared to other communities around us, and the data can help strengthen grant applications for mitigation dollars, as well. What’s also important is that it helps us explain to the residents from an emergency management perspective what potential costs somebody might incur as a standard homeowner in the county and how to make mitigation more palatable financially.”

CCIE RESEARCHERS
Chris Emrich
Claire Connolly Knox

PARTNERS
Arizona State University
Florida Atlantic University
Louisiana Sea Grant at Louisiana State University
National Academics of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Gulf Research Program
Rand Corporation
University of Florida
University of New Orleans
University of South Carolina