Photo: Jennifer Aitkens from Guelph, Ontario, Canada · CC BY 2.0Flood mapping exists for Brooke-Alvinston: 1 on record, latest by St. Clair Region Conservation Authority
The burned-area map is nearly blank around Brooke-Alvinston, 0% within 25 km since 1986, 0.000% a year. Seismic risk in Brooke-Alvinston sits near the middle: $0.018 of expected damage per $1,000 of buildings a year, the typical town $0.030. About as many homes carry radon around Brooke-Alvinston as elsewhere, 8.4% over the guideline where the typical town has 6.6%. Brooke-Alvinston grades B+ for hazard risk; wildfire is low here, so it earns no credit.
What stands out about Brooke-Alvinston’s hazards
For Brooke-Alvinston, from NRCan’s seismic model, Health Canada’s radon survey, the national burned-area record and the flood map inventory.
What Brooke-Alvinston faces
Each hazard against its own yardstick; meters run from low to high on that yardstick.
Wildfire
Earthquakes
Radon
Flood study
Brooke-Alvinston grades B+ for hazard risk
Seismic risk and radon set Brooke-Alvinston’s grade, wildfire can drag it down, and flood mapping stays out of it.
Its place: #493 of 866 in Ontario and #1,254 of 2,589 Canadian towns.
How sure: The seismic figure is a long-run average from NRCan’s model, not a prediction. The burned-area record misses fires under about 10 ha and most grass and farm fires.
Few fires near Brooke-Alvinston: 0% within 5 km, 0% within 25 km
Past fire around Brooke-Alvinston’s homes, from the national burned-area record, with the fuel within 5 km.
At 0.000% of the land a year, Brooke-Alvinston’s burn rate is in the low band; the typical Canadian town sees 0.000%.
Forest makes up 0% of the land within 5 km of Brooke-Alvinston and 0.1% within 25 km, little for a forest fire to run through.
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 Ontario · highest of 871
Among the 871 towns in Ontario, Sioux Lookout burns fastest (0.16% a year); Brooke-Alvinston is with the 638 near zero.
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.
Brooke-Alvinston shares the low band with 92% of Canada’s 2,610 towns, its burn rate rounding to nothing; 7.5% burn faster.
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.
Brooke-Alvinston is on the flood map inventory: 1 study, by St. Clair Region Conservation Authority
What Canada’s Flood Map Inventory lists for Brooke-Alvinston: who studied flooding and where to see their maps.
St. Clair Region Conservation Authority holds the flood mapping that covers Brooke-Alvinston (2009), linked below.
| Study | By | Year | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| SCRCA Floodplain Estimation Study for Ontario Regulation 171-06 | St. Clair Region Conservation Authority | 2009 | final · not public |
Towns with a flood study on file
69% of towns in Ontario have a flood study, more than Canada’s 58%; Brooke-Alvinston has one too.
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 Brooke-Alvinston.
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 Brooke-Alvinston: $0.018 per $1,000 of buildings a year
Expected yearly building losses from earthquakes, from Natural Resources Canada’s model.
Brooke-Alvinston’s $0.018 is close to the typical town’s $0.030 (0.6 times as much).
Shaking damage a year per $1,000 of building value
Brooke-Alvinston’s $0.018 sits under the median in Ontario, $0.043, and well under Alexandria’s $0.21.
NRCan seismic risk model (2022): mean yearly building loss per $1,000 of value; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
Brooke-Alvinston is in the lower part of Canada’s range for earthquake risk; 68% 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).
What a quake does after the shaking, fire, landslides, tsunami, falls outside NRCan’s figure for Brooke-Alvinston.
Natural Resources Canada, Canada’s Seismic Risk Model (2022), by census subdivision (2016 boundaries; a few 2021 subdivisions take their residents’ mean).
8.4% of homes tested around Brooke-Alvinston are over the radon guideline
Long-term radon tests in homes across the survey area, against Health Canada’s guideline. · Area-wide: radon tests, counted over the Lambton Health Unit
Around Brooke-Alvinston, 8.4% of tested homes topped the guideline, near the typical Canadian town’s 6.6%.
Tested homes over 200 Bq/m³
Over 600 Bq/m³
Brooke-Alvinston’s area, at 8.4%, is above the median in Ontario (4%), and 0.6% of its tests passed 600 Bq/m³.
Health Canada radon survey (2009–2011), by 2007 health region; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
Between 5% and 10% of tests over the guideline: Brooke-Alvinston, and 37% of Canada’s 2,611 towns; 26% are higher.
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.
Neighbouring homes in Brooke-Alvinston can differ a lot; only a long-term test tells you about yours.
Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes (2009–2011).
Where to get warnings in Brooke-Alvinston
Alerts for Brooke-Alvinston 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. |
Fire danger and active fires near Brooke-Alvinston are mapped daily by the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System; evacuation orders come from the municipality or province.
Weather alerts (ECCC) · Alert Ready · Fire danger and active fires (CWFIS)
How Brooke-Alvinston’s neighbours compare on hazards
Wildfire band, earthquake risk, radon and flood studies for each place nearby.
| Town | Wildfire | Quake $/1,000 | Radon | Flood study |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brooke-Alvinston | Low | $0.018 | 8.4% | Yes |
| Watford 3,955 · 15 km | Low | $0.014 | 8.4% | Yes |
| Glencoe 6,468 · 16 km | Low | $0.020 | 1.8% | Yes |
| Dawn-Euphemia 2,127 · 19 km | Low | $0.018 | 8.4% | Yes |
Watford burns a little more than Brooke-Alvinston, 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 Brooke-Alvinston faces
Practical steps for Brooke-Alvinston’s hazards, most pressing first.
- 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
- Radon is a survey. Radon figures pool the survey’s home tests by area: postal areas once their boundaries arrive, the 2007 health region around Brooke-Alvinston until then.
- Flood studies aren’t flood zones. Flood studies cover areas of every size, which is why the page lists them for Brooke-Alvinston without grading them.
- Wildfire counts one way. For Brooke-Alvinston, wildfire means how much nearby land burned in the past forty years, a one-way input that can pull Risk down and nothing more.
- Earthquakes are modelled. Seismic risk is NRCan’s model of yearly building losses from shaking, averaged over many years and given for Brooke-Alvinston’s census subdivision (a neighbourhood shows its city’s).
Questions about flooding and hazards in Brooke-Alvinston
How big is the earthquake risk in Brooke-Alvinston?
NRCan’s model expects shaking to cost buildings in Brooke-Alvinston $0.018 a year for every $1,000 of their value, on average over many years.
How is Brooke-Alvinston’s Hazard risk Grade worked out?
Hazard risk gives Brooke-Alvinston B+, weighing earthquakes and radon and counting wildfire only against it.
Is radon a problem in Brooke-Alvinston?
8.4% of the 178 homes Health Canada tested around Brooke-Alvinston topped the guideline; your own house needs its own test.
Does Brooke-Alvinston flood?
A flood study covers Brooke-Alvinston on Canada’s Flood Map Inventory; open the owner’s map to check a street, since flood isn’t graded.
Is Brooke-Alvinston at risk of wildfire?
Hardly at all on record: 0% of the land within 25 km of Brooke-Alvinston since 1986, a low band, though small grass fires aren’t mapped.
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).