Photo: Qyd · CC BY-SA 3.0Flood mapping exists for Signal Hill: 1 on record, latest by Government of Alberta
The burned-area map is nearly blank around Signal Hill, 0% within 25 km since 1986, 0.000% a year. For earthquakes Signal Hill is middling, $0.023 a year per $1,000 against $0.030 for the typical town. Radon is about average around Signal Hill: 8.1% of tested homes in the survey area topped the guideline, against 6.6% for the typical town. Signal Hill grades B+ for hazard risk; wildfire is low here, so it earns no credit.
What stands out about Signal Hill’s hazards
Four national sources, each read for Signal Hill: earthquakes, radon, past fires and flood studies.
What Signal Hill faces
Each hazard against its own yardstick; meters run from low to high on that yardstick.
Wildfire
Earthquakes
Radon
Flood study
Signal Hill grades B+ for hazard risk
The grade weighs Signal Hill’s seismic risk and radon equally, and wildfire is one-sided: a high band counts against a town, a low one earns nothing.
Its place: #282 of 474 in Alberta and #1,102 of 2,589 Canadian towns.
How sure: Earthquake losses are a model’s expectation over many years, not a forecast for any one. Small fires and grass fires are largely missing from the national burned-area record.
Wildfire is rare near Signal Hill: 0% of the land within 25 km burned since 1986, 0% within 5 km
Fires mapped since 1986 around where Signal Hill’s residents live, and the fuel next to their homes.
The yearly burn rate around Signal Hill is 0.000%, low beside 0.000% for the typical Canadian town.
Signal Hill’s homes have had no fire within 5 km since 1986; the closest was 7.4 km away.
Little near Signal Hill’s homes can carry a forest fire; only 2.4% of the land within 5 km is forest fuel, and 3.6% within 25 km.
Shares of land within 5 and 25 km of populated blocks: burned at least once in 1986–2025 (CWFIS burned-area composite), forest fuel and grass (fire behaviour fuel types, 2026, 250 m grid).
Burn rate a year, towns in Alberta · highest of 478
Near-zero burning puts Signal Hill with 386 of the 478 towns in Alberta, far below Wainwright at 1.43%.
Each bar: the yearly average share of land within 25 km of a town’s homes that burned, 1986–2025 (CWFIS); the seven highest towns of 2,500 people or more.
Like most of Canada’s 2,610 towns (92%), Signal Hill is in the low band, with a burn rate of zero to three decimals; 7.5% rank higher.
Bands of the yearly burn rate: low under 0.05%, moderate under 0.25%, high under 1%, very high 1% or more; towns of 2,500 people or more.
Fire danger and active fires (CWFIS)
Canadian Wildland Fire Information System: National Burned Area Composite 1986–2025 and fire behaviour fuel types (2026), Natural Resources Canada. Measured within 25 km and 5 km of each populated dissemination area; past fire, not a forecast.
Government of Alberta has mapped flooding for Signal Hill (1 study)
Flood studies whose area touches Signal Hill, from NRCan’s inventory, each linked to its owner.
The flood study touching Signal Hill is Government of Alberta’s, dated 2025; its own map shows the zones street by street.
| Study | By | Year | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bow and Elbow River Flood Study | Government of Alberta | 2025 | final |
Towns with a flood study on file
Flood maps are thinner in Alberta, 46% of towns against 58% nationally, but Signal Hill has one.
NRCan Canada Flood Map Inventory: a study footprint touching the town’s boundary; towns of 2,500 people or more.
The grade leaves flood out, since a study area says nothing about how many of Signal Hill’s homes are at risk.
The inventory’s own caution (NRCan): “The Canada Flood Map (CFM) does not include every flood hazard map in Canada and may be incomplete or contain inaccuracies. It should not be relied upon as the official source of flood mapping information. Furthermore, if a map appears to be missing, this does not necessarily mean that the area has never been mapped. For the official version of a map, updated information, or confirmation of applicable regulations, please contact the local authority responsible for flood mapping.”
Natural Resources Canada, Canada Flood Map Inventory; links go to each study’s owner.
Ordinary seismic risk in Signal Hill: $0.023 per $1,000 of buildings a year
NRCan’s seismic risk model: the damage shaking is expected to do to buildings each year, on average over many years.
Earthquake losses in Signal Hill, $0.023 per $1,000, are in line with the typical $0.030 (0.8 times).
Signal Hill shares its earthquake risk numbers with the rest of the city of Calgary.
Shaking damage a year per $1,000 of building value
Above the middle in Alberta: Signal Hill’s $0.023 against a median of $0.013, with Black Diamond highest at $0.048.
NRCan seismic risk model (2022): mean yearly building loss per $1,000 of value; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
Signal Hill’s earthquake risk lands near the centre of Canada’s range; 54% of the 2,611 towns are higher.
Each column: the share of Canada’s towns of 2,500 people or more in that range of yearly loss per $1,000 (NRCan, 2022).
The model counts damage to Signal Hill’s buildings and their occupants from shaking only: not liquefaction, landslides, tsunami or fires after a quake.
Natural Resources Canada, Canada’s Seismic Risk Model (2022), by census subdivision (2016 boundaries; a few 2021 subdivisions take their residents’ mean).
8.1% of homes tested around Signal Hill are over the radon guideline
Health Canada’s survey of long-term home tests: the share above the 200 Bq/m³ guideline. · Shared with the rest of the Calgary Health Region: radon tests
The survey area of Signal Hill reads 8.1%, a shade from the typical Canadian town’s 6.6%.
Tested homes over 200 Bq/m³
Over 600 Bq/m³
The typical town in Alberta has 7.5% over 200 Bq/m³; Signal Hill’s area has 8.1%, much the same.
Health Canada radon survey (2009–2011), by 2007 health region; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
Signal Hill is in the 5–10% band with 37% of Canada’s 2,611 towns; 26% have more.
Each bar: the share of Canada’s towns of 2,500 people or more whose survey area had that share of tests over 200 Bq/m³.
The share describes the area, not a house: in Signal Hill as anywhere, test to be sure.
Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes (2009–2011).
Weather and fire alerts for Signal Hill
Environment and Climate Change Canada issues the weather alerts for Signal Hill; Alert Ready carries the urgent ones to phones, radio and TV.
| Alert | What it means |
|---|---|
| Warning | Severe weather is happening or about to: act now. |
| Watch | Conditions favour severe weather: be ready. |
| Advisory | Weather that is less severe but could disrupt the day. |
| Special weather statement | Unusual weather worth knowing about. |
| Special air quality statement | Poor air, often wildfire smoke. |
Smoke and fire warnings for Signal Hill come through Environment Canada and Alert Ready; the fire map is CWFIS’s.
Weather alerts (ECCC) · Alert Ready · Fire danger and active fires (CWFIS)
How Signal Hill’s neighbours compare on hazards
The same four hazards for the places next door.
| Town | Wildfire | Quake $/1,000 | Radon | Flood study |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Signal Hill | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Glenbrook 10,185 · 1.2 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | None listed |
| Springbank Hill 9,913 · 1.9 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Glamorgan 6,479 · 1.9 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | None listed |
| Westgate 3,139 · 1.9 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Rosscarrock 3,862 · 2.3 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Strathcona Park 8,680 · 2.5 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | None listed |
The neighbour with the most fire is Glenbrook (low), still no more than Signal Hill (low).
Radon is the survey area’s figure, so neighbours in one area share it.
Get ready for what Signal Hill faces
What to do about the hazards Signal Hill faces, and what to ask before you buy.
- Test for three months in winter.
- Over 200 Bq/m³: fix it.
- Kits are cheap; pros test too.
- Never drive through floodwater.
- Move papers and medicines upstairs.
- Ask whether your street is mapped.
- Clear needles and wood nearby.
- Keep a grab-and-go bag ready.
- In smoke, stay in; filter air.
- Has it had a radon test?
- Check the address on the flood map.
- Are flood and wildfire insured?
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Wildfire counts one way. The wildfire figure is the share of land within 25 km of Signal Hill’s homes burned each year from 1986 to 2025, past fire rather than a forecast, and it can only lower Risk.
- Earthquakes are modelled. Shaking damage is modelled from the ground, the buildings and the odds of each quake, and published for whole subdivisions such as Signal Hill’s.
- Flood studies aren’t flood zones. NRCan’s inventory says where flood mapping exists, not where water goes; the map’s owner is the authority for Signal Hill.
- Radon is a survey. About 14,000 homes were tested across Canada in 2009–2011, and the share over the guideline for Signal Hill is its health region’s, the survey’s design unit.
Questions about flooding and hazards in Signal Hill
Is radon a problem in Signal Hill?
Around Signal Hill, 86 survey homes were tested and 8.1% came in over 200 Bq/m³, a guide to the area, not to any one home.
How is Signal Hill’s Hazard risk Grade worked out?
Hazard risk gives Signal Hill B+, weighing earthquakes and radon and counting wildfire only against it.
Does Signal Hill flood?
There is flood mapping for Signal Hill on the national inventory, each study linked to its owner’s map, none of them graded.
How big is the earthquake risk in Signal Hill?
Expected earthquake damage in Signal Hill comes to $0.023 a year for each $1,000 that buildings are worth.
Is Signal Hill at risk of wildfire?
Fire has reached 0% of the land around Signal Hill since 1986 (last in 2014); at low, it neither helps nor hurts the grade.
Seismic risk: Natural Resources Canada. Radon: Health Canada. Wildfire: Canadian Wildland Fire Information System. Flood studies: Natural Resources Canada, Canada Flood Map Inventory. Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Canada.
Sources: NRCan, Canada’s Seismic Risk Model 2022 · Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes · CWFIS, National Burned Area Composite and FBP fuel types · NRCan, Canada Flood Map Inventory. Under the Statistics Canada Open Licence.
Adapted from Statistics Canada (Census of Population 2021, population estimates 2025, 2021 census boundaries) under the Statistics Canada Open Licence; this does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada. Neighbourhood names in some cities © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).