Natural disasters kill and injure vast numbers of wild and domestic animals, yet emergency response plans rarely account for them adequately. Welfare-informed disaster planning can save many lives.
Animals face compounded welfare harms during disasters: physical injury, separation from companions and familiar environments, and loss of food and shelter. Wild animals surviving fires and floods face long recovery periods in damaged habitats. Domestic animals abandoned or lost during evacuations suffer fear, injury, and starvation. Welfare-integrated disaster planning reduces these harms while also improving human compliance with evacuation orders.