The Trump administration’s latest National Preparedness Report is the first of its kind to completely ignore climate change.
“That seems to be a really grave, missed opportunity,” said Divya Chandrasekhar, a professor at the University of Utah who specializes in disaster recovery. “The unpredictability of weather events is something we need to contend with.”
The 60-page report, prepared by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, mentions the devastating wildfires that mostly destroyed Paradise, Calif., in 2017. It also nods at severe hurricanes and floods. But it omits the role climate change has played in exacerbating such disasters.
Abigail Dennis, a spokesperson for FEMA, wrote in an email that emergency managers need to be prepared for disasters regardless of the reasons why the climate is changing.
Read more at Wyoming Public Media
