Florida's 2026 hurricane season has so far delivered something residents and emergency managers rarely allow themselves to count on: calm. NOAA predicted a below-normal Atlantic season as far back as May, and the forecast has held, through the peak of the Atlantic season, the Sunshine State has been largely spared from the direct landfalls and tropical activity that have historically tested its communities, infrastructure, and emergency response systems.

When Hurricane Harvey hit Texas as a Category 4 storm in August 2017, the eye passed right over the city of Rockport. Harvey's winds and storm surge destroyed or badly damaged much of Rockport-Fulton. The storm also wrecked the century-old breakwater that protected the harbor, and it left City Hall so damaged that inspectors ruled it unsalvageable.

When the United States’ Accountability Office (GAO) looked at why some states rebuilt homes faster than others after the 2017 hurricanes, one finding stood out: The two states spending recovery money the fastest, Texas and Florida, had more recent experience running federal disaster housing programs. Those states weren't more generous and didn't have smaller caseloads. They had done this kind of work recently.

When Canadian wildfire smoke blanketed more than 100 million Americans last week, President Trump responded with a proposal that broke new ground in how countries think about cross-border natural disasters. In a series of Truth Social posts, Trump threatened to add the cost of the smoke's economic damage to the tariffs Canada already pays on goods exported to the United States. "This is Willful Negligence," he wrote, "and becoming a yearly occurrence, costing the United States Billions of Dollars, which cost of this pollution must of necessity be added to the TARIFFS Canada is currently paying."

In mid-July, more than 100 million people across 18 states and the District of Columbia woke up to air they couldn't safely breathe. Thick, choking smoke from wildfires burning in Canada and northern Minnesota settled over the Great Lakes, Northeast, and Mid-Atlantic, sending air quality readings into the "very unhealthy" and "hazardous" range for days.

Days of relentless rain turned deadly in the Texas Hill Country in mid-July, triggering catastrophic flash flooding that killed at least two people and forced more than 200 water rescues by boat and helicopter. The hardest-hit areas were the same communities still carrying scars from devastating floods just one year earlier, including the stretch of river that claimed the lives of two dozen children and counselors at Camp Mystic in the summer of 2025.

On the evening of June 24, two massive earthquakes struck northern Venezuela within 39 seconds of each other. The first measured a magnitude 7.2. The second, centered near the coastal city of Morón, registered a 7.5, making it the strongest earthquake to hit the country in more than a century. More than 430 aftershocks followed.

NOAA released its 2026 Atlantic hurricane season outlook on May 21, and on the surface, the numbers look reassuring. Federal forecasters are predicting a below-average season, with eight to 14 named storms expected, three to six of which could become hurricanes, and one to three of those reaching major hurricane strength at Category 3 or higher.

After months of deliberation, the president's FEMA Review Council released its final report on May 7, and the picture it paints is one of sweeping change. The council, established by executive order in January 2025 to conduct a full-scale review of the agency, voted to approve a set of recommendations that would fundamentally reshape how the federal government responds when disaster strikes.

In a matter of hours on April 17 and 18, a violent stretch of severe weather tore across the Upper Midwest, leaving a path of damaged homes, downed trees, and blocked roads from Iowa and Illinois to Minnesota and Wisconsin. At least 66 tornado reports were submitted to the National Weather Service, making it one of the most significant outbreak events the region had seen in years.

When Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin touched down in Chimney Rock, North Carolina in early April, he wasn't just visiting a town still piecing itself back together after Hurricane Helene. He was laying out a new vision for how America responds to disasters.