Photo: SriMesh · CC BY-SA 3.025% of homes tested in Yorkton’s area are above the radon guideline
For Yorkton, wildfire history is close to nil: 0% of nearby land since 1986, 0.000% a year. Shaking is less of a worry than in most places, at $0.007 a year per $1,000 of building value ($0.030 typical). Hazard risk gives Yorkton a grade of B−, from earthquakes and radon alone.
What stands out about Yorkton’s hazards
Four national sources, each read for Yorkton: earthquakes, radon, past fires and flood studies.
What Yorkton faces
Each hazard against its own yardstick; meters run from low to high on that yardstick.
Wildfire
Earthquakes
Radon
Flood study
Yorkton grades B− for hazard risk
Two inputs always count for Yorkton, earthquakes and radon; the third, wildfire, counts only against a town.
Its place: #68 of 104 in Saskatchewan and #1,703 of 2,589 Canadian towns.
How sure: Earthquake losses are a model’s expectation over many years, not a forecast for any one. Small fires and grass fires are largely missing from the national burned-area record.
Few fires near Yorkton: 0% within 5 km, 0% within 25 km
Fires mapped since 1986 around where Yorkton’s residents live, and the fuel next to their homes.
The yearly burn rate around Yorkton is 0.000%, low beside 0.000% for the typical Canadian town.
Only 0% of the land within 25 km of Yorkton is forest fuel, and 0% close in.
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 Saskatchewan · highest of 104
Among the 104 towns in Saskatchewan, La Loche burns fastest (1.94% a year); Yorkton is with the 54 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.
Like most of Canada’s 2,610 towns (92%), Yorkton is in the low band, with a burn rate of zero to three decimals; 7.5% rank higher.
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.
Flooding around Yorkton is mapped in 2 studies, the newest by Water Security Agency
Flood studies whose area touches Yorkton, from NRCan’s inventory, each linked to its owner.
2 studies on the inventory touch Yorkton, the newest Water Security Agency’s from 2020, and their areas can be large, so they say maps exist, not that the town floods.
| Study | By | Year | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Yorkton | Water Security Agency | 2020 | under review · not public |
| Yorkton | Water Security Agency | 1992 | final |
Towns with a flood study on file
Flood maps are thinner in Saskatchewan, 55% of towns against 58% nationally, but Yorkton has one.
NRCan Canada Flood Map Inventory: a study footprint touching the town’s boundary; towns of 2,500 people or more.
The 2 studies touching Yorkton are spread over time, from the 1990s to the 2020s.
Study dates as the NRCan inventory lists them, one count per study touching Yorkton.
Listed, not scored: a flood study proves a map exists, not that Yorkton 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.
Low seismic risk in Yorkton: $0.007 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.
Yorkton’s $0.007 is a fraction of the typical town’s $0.030 (0.2 times as much): quiet ground by Canadian standards.
Shaking damage a year per $1,000 of building value
Shaking damage around Yorkton runs at $0.007 a year, near the $0.006 of the typical town in Saskatchewan; Weyburn has $0.033.
NRCan seismic risk model (2022): mean yearly building loss per $1,000 of value; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
Earthquakes cost less around Yorkton than in 88% of Canada’s 2,611 towns.
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 Yorkton’s 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).
Test for radon in Yorkton: 25% of area homes were over the guideline
Health Canada’s survey of long-term home tests: the share above the 200 Bq/m³ guideline. · Area-wide: radon tests, counted over the Sunrise RHA
At 25% over the guideline, the area around Yorkton beats the typical Canadian town’s 6.6%.
Tested homes over 200 Bq/m³
Over 600 Bq/m³
Radon runs higher around Yorkton than in most towns in Saskatchewan: 25% against 9.1%.
Health Canada radon survey (2009–2011), by 2007 health region; medians of towns of 2,500 people or more.
Few of Canada’s 2,611 towns (3.1%) share the 20–30% band with Yorkton, and 1.5% sit above it.
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.
The survey sampled homes around Yorkton; it can’t tell you your basement’s level.
Health Canada, Cross-Canada Survey of Radon Concentrations in Homes (2009–2011).
Weather and fire alerts for Yorkton
Alerts for Yorkton 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 Yorkton 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 Yorkton
The same four hazards for the places next door.
| Town | Wildfire | Quake $/1,000 | Radon | Flood study |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yorkton | Low | $0.007 | 25% | Yes |
| Orkney No. 244 1,957 · 13 km | Low | $0.007 | 25% | Yes |
The fire record around Orkney No. 244 is a touch heavier than Yorkton’s, but the band is the same: low (here low).
Radon is the survey area’s figure, so neighbours in one area share it.
Get ready for what Yorkton faces
What to do about the hazards Yorkton 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. Wildfire is read from the national burned-area record around Yorkton’s 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 Yorkton 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 Yorkton.
- Earthquakes are modelled. NRCan models what earthquakes would cost buildings each year on average, subdivision by subdivision; Yorkton’s figure is its subdivision’s.
Questions about flooding and hazards in Yorkton
Is Yorkton at risk of wildfire?
Very little by the national record: Yorkton’s band is low, with 0% of the land within 25 km burned since 1986, so wildfire doesn’t change its grade.
Does Yorkton flood?
There is flood mapping for Yorkton on the national inventory, each study linked to its owner’s map, none of them graded.
Is radon a problem in Yorkton?
In Health Canada’s survey, 25% of 108 homes tested in Yorkton’s area were above 200 Bq/m³, though only a test tells you about one house.
How is Yorkton’s Hazard risk Grade worked out?
Hazard risk gives Yorkton B−, weighing earthquakes and radon and counting wildfire only against it.
How big is the earthquake risk in Yorkton?
About $0.007 a year per $1,000 of building value, NRCan’s long-run expectation for Yorkton.
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).