U.S. Death Map

U.S. Death Map – A natural hazards death map of the U.S. pictured below shows where Americans are more likely to suffer death due to natural hazards such as extreme heat or cold, lightning strikes, tornadoes, hurricanes, etc.

The U.S. death map shows the risk of death from natural hazards by count with red areas are more likely than average, and blue less likely for death from natural hazards.

People living in the South along the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts have a higher likelihood of dying from a natural hazard compared to residents of the Great Lakes area and urbanized Northeast.

And while intense hurricanes and tornadoes get the steal headlines for death and destruction, the new map shows what other previous studies have found, that everyday hazards, such as severe winter and summer weather and heat, account for the majority of natural hazard deaths in the United States.

While the South has high mortality from natural hazards, other risky areas included the northern Great Plains region where heat and drought were the biggest killers and the Rocky Mountain region (Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and New Mexico) with winter weather and floods as top killers. The south-central United States is also a dangerous area, with floods and tornadoes posing the greatest threats.

Researchers found that some natural hazards were more deadly than others, including:

  • Heat/drought (ranked highest among hazards): caused 19.6 percent of total deaths due to natural hazards
  • Severe summer weather: 18.8 percent
  • Winter weather: 18.1 percent
  • Flooding: 14 percent
  • Tornadoes: 11.6 percent
  • Lightning : 11.3 percent
  • Geophysical events (such as earthquakes), wildfires and hurricanes: less than 5 percent
  • Coastal (storm surge, rip currents and coastal erosion): 2.3 percent

The safest areas are the Midwest and the Northeast, at least as far as natural hazards are concerned.

And that’s the latest news on the U.S. death map.

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