Photo: Xz1303 · CC BY-SA 3.0Okotoks is on Canada’s flood inventory: 1 listed, led by Government of Alberta
Around Okotoks, wildfire is practically absent from the record: 0% within 25 km since 1986, 0.000% a year. NRCan expects $0.024 of shaking damage a year per $1,000 of buildings in Okotoks, near the typical $0.030. About as many homes carry radon around Okotoks as elsewhere, 8.1% over the guideline where the typical town has 6.6%. Okotoks grades B+ for hazard risk; wildfire is low here, so it earns no credit.
What stands out about Okotoks’s hazards
For Okotoks, from NRCan’s seismic model, Health Canada’s radon survey, the national burned-area record and the flood map inventory.
What Okotoks faces
Each hazard against its own yardstick; meters run from low to high on that yardstick.
Wildfire
Earthquakes
Radon
Flood study
Hazard risk in Okotoks: B+
Risk averages earthquakes and radon; wildfire joins only where it pulls the average down, so a town like Okotoks with little fire nearby would get no credit for it.
Its place: #433 of 474 in Alberta and #1,360 of 2,589 Canadian towns.
How sure: Earthquake losses are a model’s expectation over many years, not a forecast for any one. The burned-area record misses fires under about 10 ha and most grass and farm fires.
Few fires near Okotoks: 0% within 5 km, 0% within 25 km
Past fire around Okotoks’ homes, from the national burned-area record, with the fuel within 5 km.
Around Okotoks fire takes 0.000% of the land in a typical year, the typical Canadian town 0.000%, which is low.
Nothing inside 5 km of Okotoks’ homes has burned since 1986, and the nearest scar is 24 km off.
Around Okotoks the forest is thin or far off: 0.2% of the land within 5 km and 0.4% within 25 km is forest fuel.
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
Fire has taken almost none of the land around Okotoks, as for 386 of the 478 towns in Alberta; Wainwright tops the list 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.
Only 7.5% of Canada’s 2,610 towns are above the low band, which holds 92%; Okotoks, at a rounded zero, is far from them.
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.
Okotoks is on the flood map inventory: 1 study, by Government of Alberta
What Canada’s Flood Map Inventory lists for Okotoks: who studied flooding and where to see their maps.
Government of Alberta holds the flood mapping that covers Okotoks (2025), linked below.
| Study | By | Year | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sheep River Flood Study | Government of Alberta | 2025 | final |
Towns with a flood study on file
Only 46% of towns in Alberta have a flood study, short of Canada’s 58%; Okotoks is one of them.
NRCan Canada Flood Map Inventory: a study footprint touching the town’s boundary; towns of 2,500 people or more.
Flood studies don’t enter the grade; they are listed so you can open the official map for Okotoks.
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.
Earthquakes cost buildings in Okotoks $0.024 per $1,000 a year
Expected yearly building losses from earthquakes, from Natural Resources Canada’s model.
Okotoks’ $0.024 is close to the typical town’s $0.030 (0.8 times as much).
Shaking damage a year per $1,000 of building value
The typical town in Alberta expects $0.013 a year; Okotoks expects $0.024, and Black Diamond $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.
Neither high nor low for Canada: 54% of the 2,611 towns expect more damage than Okotoks.
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).
What a quake does after the shaking, fire, landslides, tsunami, falls outside NRCan’s figure for Okotoks.
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 Okotoks are over the radon guideline
Long-term radon tests in homes across the survey area, against Health Canada’s guideline.
Near the middle for radon: Okotoks’ area 8.1%, the typical Canadian town 6.6%.
Tested homes over 200 Bq/m³
Over 600 Bq/m³
The typical town in Alberta has 7.5% over 200 Bq/m³; Okotoks’ 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.
Okotoks 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.
Health Canada advises testing every home, Okotoks’ included, whatever the area’s figure.
Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes (2009–2011). · Area behind the radon tests figures: the Calgary Health Region
Where to get warnings in Okotoks
Alerts for Okotoks come from Environment and Climate Change Canada and, for emergencies, Alert Ready.
| 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. |
Alert Ready carries evacuation orders for Okotoks to phones; CWFIS shows the day’s fire danger.
Weather alerts (ECCC) · Alert Ready · Fire danger and active fires (CWFIS)
How Okotoks’ neighbours compare on hazards
Wildfire band, earthquake risk, radon and flood studies for each place nearby.
| Town | Wildfire | Quake $/1,000 | Radon | Flood study |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Okotoks | Low | $0.024 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Foothills County 25,789 · 5.4 km | Low | $0.029 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Legacy 7,975 · 15 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Walden 8,190 · 17 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | Yes |
| High River 15,508 · 17 km | Low | $0.043 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Cranston 20,055 · 18 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | Yes |
| Chaparral 12,522 · 18 km | Low | $0.023 | 8.1% | Yes |
Foothills County burns a little more than Okotoks, in the same low band (low here).
Radon is the survey area’s figure, so neighbours in one area share it.
Get ready for what Okotoks faces
What to do about the hazards Okotoks 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. Burned land within 25 km of where people live, averaged over 1986–2025 and checked for fuel near homes, is the measure; it looks back, not ahead, and only ever counts against Okotoks.
- Earthquakes are modelled. The earthquake figure is an expected loss, not a forecast, worked out by NRCan for each census subdivision, Okotoks’ included.
- 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 Okotoks.
- Radon is a survey. About 14,000 homes were tested across Canada in 2009–2011, and the share over the guideline for Okotoks is its health region’s, the survey’s design unit.
Questions about flooding and hazards in Okotoks
How big is the earthquake risk in Okotoks?
NRCan’s model expects shaking to cost buildings in Okotoks $0.024 a year for every $1,000 of their value, on average over many years.
Does Okotoks flood?
There is flood mapping for Okotoks on the national inventory, each study linked to its owner’s map, none of them graded.
How is Okotoks’s Hazard risk Grade worked out?
Okotoks’ Hazard risk grade is B+, built on earthquakes and radon with a one-sided wildfire input.
Is Okotoks at risk of wildfire?
Less than most of Canada: 0% of the land within 25 km of Okotoks has burned since 1986, the last in 2013, a low band that leaves Risk alone.
Is radon a problem in Okotoks?
In Health Canada’s survey, 8.1% of 86 homes tested in Okotoks’ area were above 200 Bq/m³, though only a test tells you about one house.
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).