Photo: Judicieux · CC BY-SA 4.0Hazards in Vallée-Jonction: wildfire low, radon over the guideline in 13% of tested homes
For Vallée-Jonction, wildfire history is close to nil: 0% of nearby land since 1986, 0.000% a year. Shaking is about as much of a worry in Vallée-Jonction as in most places, at $0.049 a year per $1,000 of building value ($0.030 typical). Vallée-Jonction grades C− for hazard risk; wildfire is low here, so it earns no credit.
What stands out about Vallée-Jonction’s hazards
For Vallée-Jonction, from NRCan’s seismic model, Health Canada’s radon survey, the national burned-area record and the flood map inventory.
What Vallée-Jonction faces
Each hazard against its own yardstick; meters run from low to high on that yardstick.
Wildfire
Earthquakes
Radon
Flood study
Vallée-Jonction grades C− for hazard risk
Earthquake risk and radon make Vallée-Jonction’s grade; wildfire can only lower it, never raise it, and flood studies are listed but not scored.
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.
Wildfire is rare near Vallée-Jonction: 0% of the land within 25 km burned since 1986, 0% within 5 km
Fires mapped since 1986 around where Vallée-Jonction’s residents live, and the fuel next to their homes.
The yearly burn rate around Vallée-Jonction is 0.000%, low beside 0.000% for the typical Canadian town.
The closest burn since 1986 lies 16 km from Vallée-Jonction’s homes, none within 5 km.
Within 5 km of Vallée-Jonction, 35% of the land is forest fuel; widen the ring to 25 km and it is 42%.
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 514
Mistissini has the highest burn rate in Quebec, 0.31% a year; around Vallée-Jonction, as around 145 of the 514 towns, it rounds to 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.
Most of the country’s 2,610 towns are low-band (92%, against 7.5% above); around Vallée-Jonction, burning rounds to zero.
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.
No flood study is listed for Vallée-Jonction
Flood studies whose area touches Vallée-Jonction, from NRCan’s inventory, each linked to its owner.
NRCan’s inventory is silent on Vallée-Jonction, so any flood map would be the municipality’s own.
Towns with a flood study on file
Mapping in Quebec reaches 45% of towns, below the 58% across Canada, and not Vallée-Jonction.
NRCan Canada Flood Map Inventory: a study footprint touching the town’s boundary; towns of 2,500 people or more.
Flood is shown here, never graded: a study says where a map exists, not how many of Vallée-Jonction’s homes stand in a flood zone.
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.”
Ordinary seismic risk in Vallée-Jonction: $0.049 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.
Nothing unusual about Vallée-Jonction’s ground: $0.049 against a typical $0.030, 1.6 times.
Shaking damage a year per $1,000 of building value
At $0.049, Vallée-Jonction is below the typical town in Quebec ($0.14); La Pocatière is highest at $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.
31% of Canada’s 2,611 towns expect more shaking damage than Vallée-Jonction, 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).
What a quake does after the shaking, fire, landslides, tsunami, falls outside NRCan’s figure for Vallée-Jonction.
Natural Resources Canada, Canada’s Seismic Risk Model (2022), by census subdivision (2016 boundaries; a few 2021 subdivisions take their residents’ mean).
13% of homes tested around Vallée-Jonction are over the radon guideline
Health Canada’s survey of long-term home tests: the share above the 200 Bq/m³ guideline. · Source area for radon tests: the Chaudiere-Appalaches health region
A higher share than most: 13% of tested homes around Vallée-Jonction, the typical Canadian town 6.6%.
Tested homes over 200 Bq/m³
Over 600 Bq/m³
Vallée-Jonction’s area, at 13%, is above the median in Quebec (8.2%), 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.
More high tests than most: Vallée-Jonction sits in a band that only 22% of Canada’s 2,611 towns share, with 4.6% above.
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.
A low area share in Vallée-Jonction doesn’t clear a house, nor does a high one condemn it: test.
Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes (2009–2011).
Where to get warnings in Vallée-Jonction
Environment and Climate Change Canada issues the weather alerts for Vallée-Jonction; 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 Vallée-Jonction 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 Vallée-Jonction’s neighbours compare on hazards
The same four hazards for the places next door.
| Town | Wildfire | Quake $/1,000 | Radon | Flood study |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vallée-Jonction | Low | $0.049 | 13% | None listed |
| Saints-Anges 1,364 · 5.8 km | Low | $0.058 | 13% | None listed |
| Saint-Joseph-de-Beauce 5,339 · 8.4 km | Low | $0.056 | 13% | None listed |
| Saint-Frédéric 1,172 · 8.4 km | Low | $0.043 | 13% | None listed |
| Sainte-Marie 13,873 · 11 km | Low | $0.065 | 13% | None listed |
| Saint-Elzéar 2,842 · 11 km | Low | $0.051 | 13% | None listed |
| Frampton 1,374 · 13 km | Low | $0.053 | 13% | None listed |
Nowhere around Vallée-Jonction burns more: Saints-Anges, the closest rival, is low to its low.
Radon is the survey area’s figure, so neighbours in one area share it.
Get ready for what Vallée-Jonction faces
Practical steps for Vallée-Jonction’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?
- Ask the municipality for flood maps.
- Are flood and wildfire insured?
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Radon is a survey. About 14,000 homes were tested across Canada in 2009–2011, and the share over the guideline for Vallée-Jonction is its health region’s, the survey’s design unit.
- 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 Vallée-Jonction.
- Wildfire counts one way. For Vallée-Jonction, 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 Vallée-Jonction’s census subdivision (a neighbourhood shows its city’s).
Questions about flooding and hazards in Vallée-Jonction
How is Vallée-Jonction’s Hazard risk Grade worked out?
Vallée-Jonction grades C− for hazard risk, from earthquakes and radon, with wildfire counted only where it lowers the grade.
How big is the earthquake risk in Vallée-Jonction?
About $0.049 a year per $1,000 of building value, NRCan’s long-run expectation for Vallée-Jonction.
Is Vallée-Jonction at risk of wildfire?
Not much by Canadian standards: Vallée-Jonction’s band is low, with 0% of the land within 25 km burned since 1986 (last in 2022), so wildfire doesn’t change its grade.
Is radon a problem in Vallée-Jonction?
13% of the 175 homes Health Canada tested around Vallée-Jonction topped the guideline; your own house needs its own test.
Does Vallée-Jonction flood?
No study on Canada’s Flood Map Inventory covers Vallée-Jonction (0), which doesn’t mean it has never been mapped, so ask the municipality.
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).