April showers bring May flowers – and floods
April 9, 2018
It’s great living here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. At least until one of those lakes appears in your home. Flooding is one of the most common disasters in Minnesota, and spring is the most common time for it. Severe Weather Awareness Week is the perfect time to make sure you’re ready should a flood happen.
When you think about what causes flooding, you probably think about how melting snow can overwhelm rivers — but heavy rains are a culprit as well. You may remember the 10-14 inches of rain that fell in Waseca County in 2016. The flooding that followed prompted Minnesota’s most recent federal disaster declaration.
It will be especially important to be flood-ready this year, because the Twin Cities National Weather Service tells us this spring is likely to have higher-than-normal precipitation, and many of our rivers have a chance of reaching minor flood levels. In short, even if you don’t live in a flood plain, you should always assume that spring flooding is a possibility.
So how do you prepare for flooding?
First: Get flood insurance. Your homeowner’s insurance policy most likely doesn’t cover flooding automatically, so be sure to ask your insurance agent. More importantly, don’t assume FEMA will help if flooding damages your property. Minnesota has plenty of floods that don’t reach federal disaster levels but cause expensive damages. You can’t get federal assistance unless a federal disaster has been declared. And even if you qualify for FEMA disaster assistance, it likely wouldn’t be enough to cover all the damages. For example, the average FEMA flood assistance payout for a 2016 flood event in Louisiana was just $9,000 per household. That’s compared to the $90,000 average flood insurance settlement for the same disaster.
You may be thinking that you can only get flood insurance if you live in a flood plain, but that’s a myth. Anyone who lives in a community that participates in the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) can buy flood insurance. Fortunately, that accounts for over 95 percent of Minnesotans. You can find out whether your community participates by looking at NFIP’s Community Status Book Report. Flood insurance isn’t expensive, either — plans tend to cost between $200 and $600 per year.
Flood insurance isn’t the only way to be ready for a flood. This seven-step checklist will tell you what you need to do to prepare for flooding. That way, if the spring weather threatens to turn your home or business into Minnesota lake #10,001, you’ll be ready for it.
