Coastal Services Center

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Risk and Vulnerability Assessment Tool

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Helping Communities Visualize Risk

Communities need to be able to identify their risks and vulnerabilities to coastal storms to create effective hazard mitigation plans and lessen storm impacts. To help communities identify their risks and vulnerabilities, the NOAA Coastal Services Center worked with officials from Brevard and Volusia counties, Florida, to develop the Risk and Vulnerability Assessment Tool. This new tool, which includes an interactive spatial analysis and mapping tool, a risk and vulnerability assessment how-to guide, 3-D storm surge visualizations, and supplemental information on coastal storms and mitigation, is easily adaptable to other communities and areas.

Who's at Risk?

To help determine and prioritize the precautionary measures that can make a community more disaster-resistant, this tool helps to identify people, property, and resources that are at risk of injury, damage, or loss from hazardous incidents or natural hazards.

Through the tool's interactive map, a homeowner—for instance—is able to find out how vulnerable his or her property is to coastal storm-related hazards, such as hurricane storm surge, inland flooding, coastal erosion, and hurricane winds.

The tool provides the public with more detailed information about the potential impacts associated with each hazard, including a 3-D model simulation of hurricane storm surge for several locations within each county.

Real-time hazard forecast data, such as flood forecast information from the National Weather Service Southeast River Forecast Center, have also been incorporated into the tool.

Using a Community Approach

By engaging the community in the development of this tool, and by integrating real-time data and information from the other Coastal Storms Program projects, NOAA is striving to ensure that communities are equipped with the right information in the right format to improve their ability to plan for, respond to, and recover from coastal storms. Besides serving as a planning and decision-support tool for emergency and coastal zone managers, the tool will also educate residents, businesses, and tourists about potential coastal storm impacts within their area.

Visit the Risk and Vulnerability Assessment Tool Web site for more information.

For Additional Information

Russell Jackson
NOAA National Ocean Service
Coastal Services Center
Telephone: (843) 740-1188
E-mail: Russell.Jackson@noaa.gov