Gainbi PARK, Centre for Urban and Regional Development Studies (CURDS), Newcastle University, United Kingdom
Hurricane events are expected to increase as a consequence of climate change, increasing their intensity and severity. Destructive hurricane activities pose the greatest threat to coastal communities along the U.S. Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Coasts in the conterminous United States. Destructive hurricane activities pose the greatest threat to coastal communities along the U.S. Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Coasts in the conterminous United States. This study investigated the geographic extent of hurricane-related damage that has occurred in the United States throughout its history from 1950 to 2018 to identify the most at-risk areas of hurricanes by modeling storm surge and wind damage using geospatial analyses. As a supplement to analysis, this study further examined the overall population trend within the hurricane at-risk zones. The modeled results from every hurricane were then aggregated to a single unified spatial surface to examine the generalized hurricane patterns across the affected coastal counties. Based on this singular spatial boundary coupled with demographic datasets, zonal analysis was applied to explore the historical population at risk. A total of 775 counties were found to comprise the “hurricane-prone coastal counties” that have experienced at least one instance of hurricane damage over the study period. The overall demographic trends within the hurricane-prone coastal counties revealed that the coastal populations are growing at a faster pace than the national average, and this growth puts more people at greater risk of hurricane hazards. This study is the first comprehensive investigation of hurricane vulnerability encompassing the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts stretching from Texas to Maine over a long span of time. The findings from this study can serve as a basis for understanding the exposure of at-risk populations to hurricane-related damage within the coastal counties at a sub-national scale.
Mots clés : hurricane damage|geospatial analysis|vulnerability|hurricane-prone coastal counties|at-risk populations
A103704GP