“We’ve got to better prepare ourselves to manage these kind of weather events, whether they are droughts, wildfires, heat waves, floods, and that means in terms of emergency management in providing the kind of health assistance that you need in the aftermath of those kinds of events.”

The 2011 weather extremes could be the “new normal,” says Vaccaro with the National Weather Service. The agency is taking steps to build a weather-ready nation, which calls on a growing network of partners in the public and private sector to work together to prepare for future disasters.