Photo: Fdesjardins · CC BY 3.0Vars is on Canada’s flood inventory: 1 listed, led by South Nation Conservation
The national fire record shows next to nothing around Vars, 0% of the land within 25 km since 1986 (0.000% a year). Seismic risk runs high: $0.15 of expected damage per $1,000 of buildings a year, the typical town $0.030. About as many homes carry radon around Vars as elsewhere, 6.2% over the guideline where the typical town has 6.6%. Vars grades C+ for hazard risk; wildfire is low here, so it earns no credit.
What stands out about Vars’s hazards
Four national sources, each read for Vars: earthquakes, radon, past fires and flood studies.
What Vars faces
Each hazard against its own yardstick; meters run from low to high on that yardstick.
Wildfire
Earthquakes
Radon
Flood study
Vars grades C+ for hazard risk
The grade weighs Vars’ seismic risk and radon equally, and wildfire is one-sided: a high band counts against a town, a low one earns nothing.
Its place: #703 of 866 in Ontario and #1,894 of 2,589 Canadian towns.
How sure: Earthquake losses are a model’s expectation over many years, not a forecast for any one. The radon share rests on 64 home tests in the survey area, so a few homes move it. Small fires and grass fires are largely missing from the national burned-area record.
Little of the land around Vars has burned: 0% within 5 km, 0% within 25 km since 1986
Fires mapped since 1986 around where Vars’ residents live, and the fuel next to their homes.
Fire claims 0.000% of the land around Vars each year, a low band, with the typical Canadian town at 0.000%.
Close to Vars there is little to burn (4.9% forest fuel within 5 km), but 6.5% of the land within 25 km is forest.
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
Near-zero burning puts Vars with 638 of the 871 towns in Ontario, far below Sioux Lookout at 0.16%.
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%; Vars, 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.
A flood study covers Vars, from South Nation Conservation: 1 on the inventory
Flood studies whose area touches Vars, from NRCan’s inventory, each linked to its owner.
For Vars the inventory points to South Nation Conservation’s 2024 study, whose map is the one to check.
| Study | By | Year | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bear Brook Flood Mapping | South Nation Conservation | 2024 | under review · not public |
Towns with a flood study on file
Flood maps are common in Ontario: 69% of towns have one, against 58% nationally, and Vars is among them.
NRCan Canada Flood Map Inventory: a study footprint touching the town’s boundary; towns of 2,500 people or more.
Listed, not scored: a flood study proves a map exists, not that Vars floods.
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 Vars $0.15 per $1,000 a year
NRCan’s seismic risk model: the damage shaking is expected to do to buildings each year, on average over many years.
At $0.15 per $1,000, Vars carries roughly 5 times the typical Canadian town’s earthquake risk ($0.030).
Shaking damage a year per $1,000 of building value
At $0.15, Vars is above the typical town in Ontario ($0.043); Alexandria has the most at $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.
15% of Canada’s 2,611 towns expect more shaking damage than Vars, which places it in the upper third.
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).
Roads, pipes and bridges aren’t in Vars’ figure, nor landslides or tsunami: it is buildings and shaking.
Natural Resources Canada, Canada’s Seismic Risk Model (2022), by census subdivision (2016 boundaries; a few 2021 subdivisions take their residents’ mean). · Earthquake risk: the city of Ottawa
Some radon around Vars: 6.2% of area homes over the guideline
Health Canada’s survey of long-term home tests: the share above the 200 Bq/m³ guideline. · Measured across the City of Ottawa Health Unit: radon tests
6.2% of tested homes around Vars were over the guideline, much like the typical Canadian town at 6.6%.
Tested homes over 200 Bq/m³
Over 600 Bq/m³
More homes top the guideline around Vars (6.2%) than in the typical town in Ontario (4%).
Health Canada radon survey (2009–2011), by 2007 health region; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
Vars 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.
One home in Vars can be high while next door is low; a three-month test settles it.
Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes (2009–2011).
Weather and fire alerts for Vars
Alerts for Vars 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. |
Evacuation orders for Vars come from the municipality or the province, while CWFIS maps fire danger every day.
Weather alerts (ECCC) · Alert Ready · Fire danger and active fires (CWFIS)
Hazards in the places around Vars
The same four hazards for the places next door.
| Town | Wildfire | Quake $/1,000 | Radon | Flood study |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vars | Low | $0.15 | 6.2% | Yes |
| Navan - Sarsfield 2,853 · 8.5 km | Low | $0.15 | 6.2% | Yes |
| Embrun 23,655 · 11 km | Low | $0.19 | 6.1% | Yes |
| Edwards - Carlsbad Springs 3,536 · 11 km | Low | $0.15 | 6.2% | None listed |
| Portobello South 29,960 · 14 km | Low | $0.15 | 6.2% | Yes |
| Cardinal Creek 11,676 · 16 km | Low | $0.15 | 6.2% | Yes |
| Chapel Hill South 14,278 · 16 km | Low | $0.15 | 6.2% | None listed |
The neighbour with the most fire is Navan - Sarsfield (low), still no more than Vars (low).
Radon is the survey area’s figure, so neighbours in one area share it.
Get ready for what Vars faces
What to do about the hazards Vars 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.
- Drop, cover and hold on.
- Strap the water heater down.
- Keep 72 hours of supplies.
- Has it had a radon test?
- Check the address on the flood map.
- Are flood and wildfire insured?
- Is earthquake cover included?
What this data can and can’t tell you
- 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 Vars.
- Wildfire counts one way. Wildfire is read from the national burned-area record around Vars’ homes since 1986, a history of fire that may lower Risk but never raises it.
- Radon is a survey. About 14,000 homes were tested across Canada in 2009–2011, and the share over the guideline for Vars is its health region’s, the survey’s design unit.
- Earthquakes are modelled. NRCan models what earthquakes would cost buildings each year on average, subdivision by subdivision; Vars’ figure is its subdivision’s.
Questions about flooding and hazards in Vars
Is radon a problem in Vars?
In Health Canada’s survey, 6.2% of 64 homes tested in Vars’ area were above 200 Bq/m³, though only a test tells you about one house.
Does Vars flood?
There is flood mapping for Vars on the national inventory, each study linked to its owner’s map, none of them graded.
Is Vars at risk of wildfire?
The burned-area record shows next to nothing around Vars (0% within 25 km since 1986), so its band is low.
How big is the earthquake risk in Vars?
About $0.15 a year per $1,000 of building value, NRCan’s long-run expectation for Vars.
How is Vars’s Hazard risk Grade worked out?
Hazard risk gives Vars C+, weighing earthquakes and radon and counting wildfire only against it.
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).