Scoring Methodology

The EPI in one paragraph

The Emergency Preparedness Index is a 0–100 composite of six category scores — Weather, Environment, Civil, Infrastructure, Health, and Cyber — reflecting active threat conditions for a location over roughly the last 24–48 hours. It is a "what needs your attention today" number, not a long-term risk rating. Bands: 0–19 Low, 20–44 Moderate, 45–69 High, 70–100 Critical.

How the live categories are scored

• Weather — scored from active National Weather Service alert tiers: Advisory +15, Watch +30, Warning +50 (counted per county under warning), Particularly Dangerous Situation / Extreme +70. Capped at 100.
• Environment — earthquakes within 100 miles over the last 7 days, scored by moment magnitude (under 3.0 negligible; 3.0–4.9 minor; 5.0–6.9 moderate-to-major; 7.0+ severe), combined with the nearest river gauge's current stage against its NWS flood-stage threshold, plus satellite wildfire detections within 50 miles.
• Civil (federal) — active FEMA declarations for the state: none = 0 base, emergency / fire-management declaration +40, major disaster declaration +70.

Every category score carries a live flag. Dashboard cards show a green Live badge when the number was computed from real-time feeds, and a gray Est. badge when a feed was unreachable or the category has not been wired to live data yet — so you always know which numbers are real-time and which are estimates.

Data Sources

There is no reliable public real-time feed for local incidents such as active shooter events, so those are added by our team from verified news reports as they're confirmed.