Exposure of US counties to Atlantic tropical storms

Hurricane losses in the United States are significant andincreasing. Planning for the possible impacts ofhurricanes requires a careful analysis of the exposure of the population, the built environment,and the economic system to hurricane conditions.

Exposure of counties in the continental United States to tropical storm and

hurricane conditions was determined using the historic record of storm tracks for the period

1851–2003. Two approaches were used to determine exposure: (1) cumulative number of

hits, with a hit occurring when the storm’s path crosses a county and (2) cumulative

exposure factor, which describes how much of the county has been exposed to tropical

storm, hurricane, and intense hurricane-force winds. In both approaches the top 10 counties

in terms of cumulative exposure are in coastal Florida, North Carolina, and Louisiana. An

explanatory model was developed to describe the patterns in the documented exposure,

which included distance to coast, latitude, longitude, size, and shape of the counties.

Multivariate linear regression confirmed that much of the spatial variability in exposure to

storm conditions can be explained with these simple parameters.

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