![castle on the coast that gets flooded yearly castle on the coast that gets flooded yearly](https://miro.medium.com/max/3840/1*1pHroQiojocFl1LUWGWsmA.jpeg)
Most policies are underpriced relative to the actual cost of flood damage. The federal government provides the vast majority of residential flood insurance in the U.S. Poorer people stand to lose the most to flooding as the climate changes, and the federal government is ill-prepared to address the problem through the current federal flood insurance program. But there are hotspots across the country, including parts of the West that are increasingly threatened by wildfires as well. Residences at risk for expensive flood damage are concentrated on the coasts and in Appalachia. "These properties are going to face a significant economic loss over this 30-year period, and it's something they're just not built to defend against," says Matthew Eby, executive director of the First Street Foundation. The cost of flood damage to homes nationwide will increase by more than 50% in the next 30 years, the First Street Foundation estimates. have substantial risk of expensive flood damage, according to data released by the First Street Foundation, a nonprofit research organization that studies flood risk and housing. More than 4 million houses and small apartment buildings across the contiguous U.S. And new data make it clear that many households and communities cannot afford the mounting costs. Sea level rise and heavier rainstorms driven by global warming are sending more water into residential neighborhoods from the Gulf Coast to New England to Appalachia to the Pacific Northwest.
![castle on the coast that gets flooded yearly castle on the coast that gets flooded yearly](https://wgwr.icenroll.pl/templates/64af9ff6ec07d70d68e9adf4e68843a5/img/38a6762d5310b8a0f44cb31c7aee04dc.jpg)
Rainelle is one of hundreds of small towns where climate-driven flooding potentially poses an existential threat. "Not so much for myself, but for the people I could hear." "I did a lot of praying that night," he says. He wondered if he would survive the night. As it got dark, he could hear people screaming for help.
![castle on the coast that gets flooded yearly castle on the coast that gets flooded yearly](https://www.gyurgyak.net/img/s/v-10/p2935102752-5.jpg)
He took shelter on the second floor of his neighbor's house and waited as the water kept rising. Trigg's house was one-story tall, so there was nowhere to escape. When the creek near downtown jumped its banks on the evening of June 23, 2016, the water immediately flooded into every home on Trigg's block. Rainelle is a small town in a steep valley. "You could hear the water up in the mountains just crashing trees," Trigg remembers. In the past, such intense downpours would last only a few hours, but this storm brought wave after wave of torrential rain. It had been raining hard all day, filling the creeks and rivers that run through southern West Virginia. Pastor Aaron Trigg was at home when the water arrived in Rainelle. When large numbers of people don't have insurance or savings after a disaster, the effects can ripple through the community. Years later, the town still hasn't recovered.