America’s Top 10 “Safest” States

Here is something that readers may find interesting in the wake of all the natural disasters recently:

The devastating earthquake and tsunami near Japan have led to renewed interest in the safest places to live. Over the past week, Web searches on “safest countries” and “countries with fewest natural disasters” have more than tripled.

According to a recent article from Slate, the countries of Estonia, Qatar, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, and Andorra may be the least likely to suffer a natural disaster. The data comes from the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters.

The records aren’t totally complete, but again according to Slate, the centre has “no record of fatal floods, droughts, earthquakes, or severe storms in any of these countries from 1900 to 2009.”

Of course not everybody can just up and move to Qatar. For people who want to stay in the United States, there are similar studies on the safest places to live. A company called Sustain Lane found that in 2008, all things considered, Mesa, Arizona, is the safest big city to live. Miami, Florida, with its hurricanes, was found to be the least safe.  [Yahoo Shine]

You can read more at the link, but here was the 10 Safest States to Live:

1. Rhode Island
2. Utah
3. Wyoming
4. Washington, DC
5. Delaware
6. Connecticut
7. South Carolina
8. Colorado
9. Nevada
10. Montana

I was surprised to see that New Mexico didn’t make the list considering that as far as natural disasters it is on par with the other Rocky Mountain states that made the list.  Really the only natural disaster you have to worry about in New Mexico is wildfires.