10 most hurricane-vulnerable counties for 2023

This year’s hurricane season is on now, and will run through Nov. 30 2023. In May, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) predicted a 40-percent chance of a near-normal Atlantic hurricane season this year, with 12-17 named storms. Five to nine of those storms could become hurricanes, including one to four major hurricanes of category 3,4 or 5. Recently, Colorado State University released its third 2023 hurricane forecast, which predicts 18 named storms, and nine hurricanes, four of which could be major.

With climate change, storms are becoming more frequent and stronger, leaving U.S. communities on the East Coast on edge to prepare and recover from the sometimes devastating effects of these powerful storms. Gutter Gnome recently ranked the country’s most hurricane-vulnerable counties by combining hurricane risk assessments by the National Center for Disaster Preparedness (NCDP) with 10 years of historical storm data and financial impact projections from government agencies.

Gutter Gnome evaluated U.S. counties based on three metrics: Risk, Hurricane History and Financial Impact. For each of 318 U.S. counties with a Hurricane Risk Score determined by the National Center for Disaster Preparedness (NCDP), they gathered data on each factor from Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), NCDP and NOAA to get each county’s overall score. The Southeast has the biggest hurricane risks, with Florida and South Carolina counties making up the majority of the top 10. Click through the gallery above to see the top 10 most hurricane-vulnerable counties in the U.S.