Important Takeaways:

• Nine out of the 10 years with the highest number of natural disasters occurred in the last decade.
• The number of natural weather disasters with damages of more than a billion dollars has increased over the last forty years, from an average 3.3 per year in the 1980s to 17+ from 2014–2023.
• Since 1980, there have been 395 natural weather disasters in the US with total costs over $1 billion in 2024 dollars, including 201 severe storms, 63 tropical cyclones (or hurricanes), 44 floods, 31 droughts, 24 winter storms, 23 wildfires, and nine freezes.
• In total, these disasters cost $2.77 trillion (adjusting for inflation) and took the lives of nearly 16,500 people.
• The bulk of these events happened post-1990: In the 1980s, there were a total of 33-billion-dollar natural disaster events, with 2,994 deaths. In the last 10 full years (2014–2023), this number rose to 173, resulting in 5,872 deaths. All told, nearly 40% of the billion-dollar climate events that have hit the US since 1980 happened between 2017 and the present day.
• 2023 had the most billion-dollar natural disaster events of any year to date.
• Which types of natural disasters are the costliest?
• Major tropical cyclones, including hurricanes, have done the most damage in terms of both total costs and loss of life.
• The eight costliest natural disasters since 1980 were all tropical cyclones, with 2005’s Hurricane Katrina as the costliest at $200B. After adjusting for inflation, these eight events accounted for $888 billion in damages. Cyclones account for just over half of all costs associated with billion-dollar disasters, with approximately $1.4 trillion in total damages.
• Tropical cyclones were also responsible for 6,934 deaths, or 42.0% of the total caused by billion-dollar disasters, with the two most fatal — Katrina and 2017’s Hurricane Maria — accounting for 4,814.
• Droughts, which can be fatal during extreme heat, accounted for another 27.4% of deaths, though most of those were pre-2000.
• There have been 395 billion-dollar natural disasters since 1980.
• Which states are most affected by natural disasters?
• Historically, the South, Central, and Southeast regions incurred the highest costs from billion-dollar disaster events. Texas, Florida, and Louisiana disasters cost the most, each paying for more than $300 billion in damages (in 2024 dollars) since 1980.
• Billion-dollar natural disaster costs from Texas, Louisiana, and Florida totaled more than $1.14 trillion since 1980.

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