Risk Assessments: Preparing Your Business for Severe Weather Threats
Understanding the importance of weather preparedness is crucial for businesses to mitigate the risks and challenges of frequent extreme weather events.
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A road sign warns drivers of weather conditions in downtown Washington, DC October 28, 2012 ahead of Hurricane Sandy's landfall. US emergency officials braced for the potentially massive impact of a so-called "Frankenstorm" Sunday as Hurricane Sandy lumbered north in the Atlantic Ocean, poised to hit the Eastern Seaboard with torrential rains and gale-force winds. The superstorm was expected to make landfall somewhere between Virginia and Massachusetts early Tuesday, possibly causing chaos during the frenzied last days of campaigning before the November 6 US presidential vote. AFP PHOTO / Eva HAMBACH (Photo credit should read EVA HAMBACH/AFP via Getty Images)
Severe weather can create serious challenges for businesses, from operational disruptions to safety risks for employees and customers.
Strong winds, flooding and tornadoes can quickly impact supply chains, damage facilities, and make travel dangerous. Conducting a weather risk assessment allows businesses to identify vulnerabilities and take proactive steps to reduce potential damage before severe conditions arrive.
Some of the most common severe weather risks include supply chain disruptions, warehouse and building damage, and hazardous travel conditions. By understanding these risks and preparing for them in advance, businesses can improve safety, minimize downtime, and protect both employees and assets.
>> AccuWeather SkyGuard® Severe Weather Warnings better protect people and property when severe weather threatens. Each warning is communicated instantly with AccuWeather’s proven Superior Accuracy™ through multiple channels and dissemination methods, all customized to your specific needs. >>
An aerial view of the Hudson River as a barge makes it way through the icy river during freezing temperatures, seen from the Edge observation deck in New York City on January 28, 2026. A life-threatening freeze is gripping large swaths of the United States after a monster storm caused at least 38 deaths from the Deep South to the Northeast, knocked out power to hundreds of thousands and sent air travel into chaos. Another Arctic blast expected this weekend could deliver fresh misery for more than 100 million Americans, with record low temperatures and another major storm threatening -- even as municipalities are digging out from deep piles of snow and ice. (Photo by ANGELA WEISS / AFP via Getty Images)
Five tips to prepare for supply chain disruptions
1. Create an emergency plan: A backup plan and preparing for supply chain disruptions is always good idea. For example, have extra financial resources and design a plan to move goods and supplies to prevent and prepare for potential disruptions.
2. Build up inventory: Stockpile several months of essential supplies so your business can survive disruptions. If supply chains are disrupted, you may have to store goods and materials needed to maintain your business.
3. Diversify suppliers and identify backup vendors: Come up with other suppliers that can give you what you need if your current supplier can't get goods to you. You may have to diversify suppliers and find suppliers in different geographic locations to get you what you need. That way, you'll always be able to get what you need if there is a disruption.
4. Incorporate risk management: Utilize technology and experts to evaluate potential threats to your supply chain. Understand where you may have supply chain disruption that could affect product quality, pricing, and availability.
5. Communicate with Customers: Customers only care if you have supply chain issues. They want their products. Make sure you plan to communicate earlier rather than later when there are delays or disruptions.
Signage for Commerce Park office park in the Silicon Valley, Santa Clara, California, November 6, 2025. (Photo by Smith Collection/Gado/Getty Images)
Business Continuity
Severe weather is a threat to safety, a risk to business continuity and an interference to a facility’s productivity. Site safety managers and business continuity leaders are tasked with maintaining a safe working environment while not compromising the operations and efficiency of their business.
In an industry where one-minute in a storm shelter could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost productivity, a site’s severe weather response must delicately balance safety with solvency. Weather readiness begins with a thorough analysis of possible hazards, operational gaps, and physical vulnerabilities. This analysis is best performed through historical research and collaborative discussions to identify a site’s severe weather exposure.
Every facility, operation and team has a unique vulnerability to weather that should be discovered and discussed. Armed with a thorough understanding of their facility’s weather vulnerability, safety managers should evaluate their ability to quickly enact protective actions for a weather threat.
Managers should identify the team that will be responsible for receiving severe weather notifications, acknowledging their receipt of them, and triggering the appropriate protective action. This team should have triple-redundancy in the methods that they receive and disseminate warnings issued by AccuWeather For Business to ensure that the warning will be received.
Site leadership and safety teams are encouraged to work together to identify safe shelter locations, prepare those shelters with appropriate first aid equipment, and then properly train their staff to follow the site’s emergency action plan. This plan should be simple, accessible, and include the specific instructions that they should follow during an emergency.
Lastly, a site’s emergency preparedness program should be revisited frequently, tested annually, and trained-on regularly. Once an event occurs, forensic meteorologists can support your insurance claims and your review of the event.
Record the success of your emergency action plan in an after-action report following an incident so that your plan can continually be improved.
Cars sit abandoned on the flooded Major Deegan Expressway in the Bronx on September 02, 2021, in New York City. As it weakened, Ida brought torrential rain, flooding and wind that killed numerous people in New York and tornadoes that damaged parts of New Jersey. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
AccuWeather’s SkyGuard Severe Weather Warnings
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As an example of AccuWeather’s proven Superior Accuracy™, for tornadoes, on average, AccuWeather provides 16 minutes of advance notice compared to an average of only eight minutes from the National Weather Service. In some cases, we often provide much more advance notice.
Businesses that invest in AccuWeather’s SkyGuard Severe Weather Warnings also get access to a team of expert severe weather meteorologists, 24x7x365. AccuWeather does not just send you a warning; we confirm that you have received it, so you can make the best weather-impacted decisions for your business every time.
<<Why take unnecessary risks? Contact AccuWeather today to get AccuWeather's SkyGuard® Severe Weather Warnings to better prepare your business and keep your employees safer for all severe weather threats.>>
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