![Rue principale à Cap-Santé . - [1930]](https://images.townratings.com/ca/town_images/52434030/b9b4ae56130e42df4136.jpg)
Photo: Unknown Unknown · Public domainHazards in Cap-Santé: wildfire low, radon over the guideline in 8.8% of tested homes
Fire has left almost no mark near Cap-Santé: 0% of the land within 25 km since 1986, 0.001% a year. Earthquakes add more: NRCan’s model puts building losses at $0.12 a year per $1,000 of value, against $0.030 for the typical town. Cap-Santé grades C for hazard risk; wildfire is low here, so it earns no credit.
What stands out about Cap-Santé’s hazards
For Cap-Santé, from NRCan’s seismic model, Health Canada’s radon survey, the national burned-area record and the flood map inventory.
What Cap-Santé faces
Each hazard against its own yardstick; meters run from low to high on that yardstick.
Wildfire
Earthquakes
Radon
Flood study
Cap-Santé grades C for hazard risk
The grade weighs Cap-Santé’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: #262 of 507 in Quebec and #2,215 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.
Wildfire is rare near Cap-Santé: 0% of the land within 25 km burned since 1986, 0% within 5 km
Fires mapped since 1986 around where Cap-Santé’s residents live, and the fuel next to their homes.
A burn rate of 0.001% a year keeps Cap-Santé in the low band (the typical Canadian town: 0.000%).
No fire has burned within 5 km of Cap-Santé’s homes since 1986; the nearest burn is 11 km away.
Forest fuel covers 24% of the land close to Cap-Santé and 33% across 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 Quebec · highest of 513
At 0.001% a year, Cap-Santé ranks 136th of the 513 towns in Quebec; Mistissini leads at 0.31%.
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.
7.5% of Canada’s 2,610 towns burn fast enough to rank moderate or above; Cap-Santé stays low, with 92%.
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.
The flood map inventory lists nothing for Cap-Santé
Flood studies whose area touches Cap-Santé, from NRCan’s inventory, each linked to its owner.
Canada’s Flood Map Inventory lists no study whose area touches Cap-Santé, which doesn’t mean it has never been mapped.
Towns with a flood study on file
Only 45% of towns in Quebec have a flood study, short of Canada’s 58%, and Cap-Santé is not among them.
NRCan Canada Flood Map Inventory: a study footprint touching the town’s boundary; towns of 2,500 people or more.
Nothing here counts toward Risk; the studies are pointers to the maps their owners keep for Cap-Santé.
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.”
Earthquakes cost buildings in Cap-Santé $0.12 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.
The typical town loses $0.030 a year to shaking; Cap-Santé loses $0.12, 4 times as much.
Shaking damage a year per $1,000 of building value
About level with the typical town in Quebec: Cap-Santé’s $0.12 against $0.14; La Pocatière reaches $0.48.
NRCan seismic risk model (2022): mean yearly building loss per $1,000 of value; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
More earthquake risk than most: only 23% of Canada’s 2,611 towns are above Cap-Santé.
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).
Only shaking damage to buildings in Cap-Santé is counted; landslides, liquefaction, tsunami and fire after a quake aren’t.
Natural Resources Canada, Canada’s Seismic Risk Model (2022), by census subdivision (2016 boundaries; a few 2021 subdivisions take their residents’ mean).
Some radon around Cap-Santé: 8.8% of area homes over the guideline
Health Canada’s survey of long-term home tests: the share above the 200 Bq/m³ guideline.
Around Cap-Santé, 8.8% of tested homes topped the guideline, near the typical Canadian town’s 6.6%. Cap-Santé doesn’t get its own radon tests figures; the ones here come from the Capitale-Nationale health region.
Tested homes over 200 Bq/m³
Over 600 Bq/m³
2.5% of tests around Cap-Santé passed 600 Bq/m³; over 200, its 8.8% matches the median in Quebec, 8.2%.
Health Canada radon survey (2009–2011), by 2007 health region; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
A middling share of high tests puts Cap-Santé with 37% of Canada’s 2,611 towns, below 26% of them.
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.
Whatever Cap-Santé’s area share, the reading that matters is your own home’s, over a winter.
Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes (2009–2011).
Where to get warnings in Cap-Santé
Environment and Climate Change Canada issues the weather alerts for Cap-Santé; 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 Cap-Santé come through Environment Canada and Alert Ready; the fire map is CWFIS’s.
Weather alerts (ECCC) · Alert Ready · Fire danger and active fires (CWFIS)
Hazards in the places around Cap-Santé
The same four hazards for the places next door.
| Town | Wildfire | Quake $/1,000 | Radon | Flood study |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cap-Santé | Low | $0.12 | 8.8% | None listed |
| Donnacona 7,785 · 5.2 km | Low | $0.11 | 8.8% | None listed |
| Portneuf 3,410 · 7.5 km | Low | $0.11 | 8.8% | None listed |
| Saint-Basile 2,918 · 8.1 km | Low | $0.13 | 8.8% | Yes |
| Sainte-Croix 2,612 · 8.9 km | Low | $0.13 | 13% | None listed |
| Pont-Rouge 11,339 · 11 km | Low | $0.15 | 8.8% | None listed |
| Saint-Édouard-de-Lotbinière 1,295 · 12 km | Low | $0.15 | 13% | None listed |
Donnacona (low) has the heaviest fire record of Cap-Santé’s neighbours, and Cap-Santé (low) matches or beats it.
Radon is the survey area’s figure, so neighbours in one area share it.
Get ready for what Cap-Santé faces
What to do about the hazards Cap-Santé 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?
- Ask the municipality for flood maps.
- Are flood and wildfire insured?
- Is earthquake cover included?
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Flood studies aren’t flood zones. A study’s area can be a whole watershed or province, so being on the inventory says a map exists, not that a home in Cap-Santé floods.
- 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 Cap-Santé.
- Radon is a survey. The radon share comes from about 14,000 long-term home tests in 2009–2011, pooled for now by the 2007 health region Cap-Santé sits in.
- Earthquakes are modelled. The earthquake figure is an expected loss, not a forecast, worked out by NRCan for each census subdivision, Cap-Santé’s included.
Questions about flooding and hazards in Cap-Santé
How is Cap-Santé’s Hazard risk Grade worked out?
Cap-Santé grades C for hazard risk, from earthquakes and radon, with wildfire counted only where it lowers the grade.
Does Cap-Santé flood?
With 0 studies on the inventory, Cap-Santé’s flood risk is unmapped nationally; check with the municipality before buying.
How big is the earthquake risk in Cap-Santé?
Expected earthquake damage in Cap-Santé comes to $0.12 a year for each $1,000 that buildings are worth.
Is Cap-Santé at risk of wildfire?
Fire has reached 0% of the land around Cap-Santé since 1986 (last in 2003); at low, it neither helps nor hurts the grade.
Is radon a problem in Cap-Santé?
Around Cap-Santé, 160 survey homes were tested and 8.8% came in over 200 Bq/m³, a guide to the area, not to any one home.
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).