In September 1989, Hugo, a category 4 (close to 5) Atlantic hurricane, struck Guadeloupe, a french territory of the West-Indies. Since that disastrous Tropical Cyclone (TC), several other meteorological events caused losses of lives, casualties and severe damages in the french territories of the Caribbean (Martinique, Guadeloupe and its northern islands, Saint-Martin and Saint-Barthélemy).

This paper presents the peculiar status of these territories, belonging both to France, as overseas Departments and Regions, and to the European Union,thus resulting in specific ways of overcoming natural disasters and measures for crisis management. It further summarizes the past frequency of tropical Storms and Hurricanes and their secondary effects such as floods, mud-rock flows, storm surges and heavy waves on these small islands of the Lesser Antilles, as well as their probability of occurrence in the future.

A focus is also made on the way the successive dramatic events of the last decades resulted in new responses in monitoring techniques, in various preparedness actions against TC. Our analysis shows that the new specific hurricane warning systems, by using the results of recent experiences do not necessarily fit to the future threats, as each TC event corresponds to specific hazards. Consequently, if the recent TC events of the last decades resulted in a global enhanced capability in preparedness against TC disasters, the corresponding generalisation also induced partly negative responses.

Further the vulnerability is analysed as function of time, population increase, coastal occupation and urban growth, and in interaction with peculiar insular mentalities. The analysis reveals that the improvements in the disaster prevention result simultaneously from both improvements in the crisis management and a better population awareness in relation to the TC threats thanks to the recent experiences.