Perhaps it has been recent and very public warning failures, or perhaps this has been in the works for a while. See this story, FEMA Announces $40M Funding to States and Tribal Nations to Help Notify the Public During Emergencies, https://www.hstoday.us/subject-matter-areas/emergency-preparedness/fema-announces-40m-funding-to-states-and-tribal-nations-to-help-notify-the-public-during-emergencies/

I’ve written about heat emergencies before. There have been several significant heat events here in the United States. Chicago was hit hard back in 1992 and a book was written about those events and the actions taken to try and save lives, see Heat Wave: A Social Autopsy of Disaster in Chicago  Even in the relatively cool Pacific Northwest where I live, a heat dome caused many deaths in Seattle and Portland, a few years ago—in June!

Climate change will impact the world. There won’t be one area of the world that escapes its impacts, on sea, in the air and on land.

The is the most recent Disaster Zone Podcast: Using Aerial Tech for Estimating Damages

These are brave men and women who signed a letter decrying all the changes being made at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). See this Washington Post article, FEMA staff warn Trump officials’ actions risk a Katrina-level disaster

Climate induced flooding is becoming more prevalent throughout the world. See this BBC story, More than 200 missing in flood-hit district in Pakistan, official says

It was predicted to be an active hurricane season. The first “biggie storm” in the Atlantic is Erin and it looks to be one where we’ll dodge a Category 4 bullet.

It might sound farfetched, but very likely to happen before the end of this decade. See this Washington Post article, These nuclear reactors fit on a flatbed truck. How safe are they?

There was a recent article in Climate Wire with the headline, “FEMA says in court filing it “has not ended disaster grant program.”  The program they are talking about is the Building Resilient Infrastructure Communities (BRIC) that was announced as being cancelled back in April by the then acting FEMA Administrator

As we look at all the wildfires burning in North America right now, I don’t know if we’ll beat the record for 2024 or not. For more information on the 2024 wildfire season see this National Interagency Coordination Center Wildland Fire Summary and Statistics Annual Report 2024  The 2024 fire season recorded 8,924,884 acres burned.

It is always helpful to look backward at incidents to determine the root causes for disaster impacts. It is routinely done for aircraft crashes, and we could do more of this for natural disasters.

This has to be the shortest turnaround ever, between when grant applications were announced and then when they were due for submission. See this article from August 1^st, FEMA Announces Billions in Federal Funds to Empower States to Prepare for Disasters he three is “fast.”

Check out this Disaster Zone Podcast, Disaster Preparedness Beyond Food and Water

While emergency managers do many a presentation on how individuals and families can become better prepared for a disaster—our message should go beyond “having all your important documents in one place. In this podcast we learn of a system that can help people do that in advance of a disaster. The podcast guest is Maria Fraietta the founder and visionary behind The Nokbox https://www.thenokbox.com/, a pioneering estate planning tool and home organization system designed to support an individual’s Next of Kin.

“There’s nothing we could have done” is a phrase that rings hollow to me. This is what the Kerr County officials who were responsible for emergency management said about their lack of response to the flooding that killed over 100 people.

The tragic flooding in Texas has once again reminded us how quickly water can become deadly — and how much is still at stake when it comes to protecting lives. My thoughts are with the families and communities reeling from this loss.

The Texas flood event is still in the news. Rescues have turned into searches and there has been more rain in the area. I noted that some elected officials said something like, “Now is not the time to figure out what went wrong.” That was early in the event. It reminded me of such statements following an incident of gun violence. I say, you need to capitalize on the event and learn from it, to ensure that the same mistakes are not made again, either by yourself or another agency who might just learn from your disaster.

I think that so far in 2025 I’ve read countless numbers of articles and listened to many different podcasts about legal matters surrounding the powers of the President. While there have been a number of Supreme Court rulings favoring the powers of the executive branch, the lawsuits continue. Such as this one, 20 states sue FEMA for canceling grant program that guards against natural disasters

With the Texas flash flooding dominating disaster news for the last several weeks, numerous emergency management topics have been in the media. They have included flood planning, issuing of warnings, warning methodologies, emergency management responsibilities, at the city, county and state, zoning, land management, permitting, search and rescue, etc. The list includes FEMA’s performance in the response.

Check out the most recent  Disaster Zone Podcast, Destroying FEMA

he head line tells the story, Camp Mystic’s leader got a ‘life threatening’ flood alert. They evacuated an hour later

It is literally a “read it and weep” story. The National Weather Service did its job to the best of their ability. The storms were detected. Flood watches and warnings were sent in a timely manner. The final aspect of warnings that I’ve written about time and again was the fact that people/leadership did not act on the warnings that they did receive.