Equality and Inequality in Severe Weather Warnings: A Comparison of English and Spanish Speaking Populations

Forecasts and warnings are key communication products that the National Weather Service uses to achieve their mission to protect life and property. However, for people to utilize these products to make protective decisions they must be able to receive the information, understand what it means, and respond appropriately (Ripberger et al. 2019). Although there have been several studies that focus on how English speakers receive, understand, and respond to tornado forecasts and warnings, there has been little work done for Spanish speaking populations. The majority of weather warning information is also issued in English, which can increase Spanish speakers' vulnerability when English is not their first language. Using data from the Severe Weather and Society Survey English and Spanish versions (2018-2022), this work assesses how forecast and warning reception, comprehension and response for Spanish speakers compare to English speakers. This study will address the following research questions: Are there inequalities between English and Spanish speaking communities? Where do they exist in the reception, understanding, and response process? What can we do to reduce these inequalities? By combining these questions and building a composite scale we can compare the mean scores between these two groups. Our results show that there are some possible inequalities between how English and Spanish speakers receive, understand, and respond to tornado warning information. Possible explanations and recommendations will be provided.