2018 Natural Hazards Digital Reconnaissance Database

This is a database of the results of a digital reconnaissance conducted for all natural hazards for the calendar year 2018 as it pertains to structural damage. To form the digital reconnaissance database, the process of scouring online sources and collecting information was repeated until 2018 was exhausted of events. This process was conducted manually, although filters on rough damage estimators such as cost estimates and earthquake magnitudes were applied to exclude events in which the likelihood of structural damage was negligible. All collected information was stored in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, in which each row corresponds to an event, and each individual event was assigned a unique folder to hold supplementary files, like photos and articles. As the goal of this project was to amass a database of damage to structures in rural areas that was as inclusive as possible, a variety of online sources were tapped for potential events. These data pools include: National Weather Service Damage Viewer; Local News Articles; Social Media; Did You Feel It? Earthquake Archive; and, NOAA Storm Events Database.