Dolin explains the terminology he will use in his text. He states that damage estimates for the hurricanes mentioned reflect the numbers gathered in the year the disaster took place. He adds that prior to the 1980s, death tolls only included deaths that happened during the storm as a direct result of the hurricane. Thus, older fatality counts may be disproportionately low. However, since then, improved methodologies have enabled researchers to quantify and assess indirect deaths which occurred as a result of the hurricane. The causes of these deaths may range from being killed in a traffic accident owing to a hurricane-induced power outage, to dying of a heart attack during the clean-up effort.

Dolin opens his study by narrating the experience of survivors of Hurricane Audrey in 1957. He details the personal experience of Dr. Cecil and Sybil Clark of Cameron Parish, Louisiana, who lost their three youngest children to rising water levels. He explains how “this harrowing and tragic story is just one of thousands that played out that day,” thus giving a sense of the vast scale of destruction (xix).

Dolin goes on to give a broad overview of hurricanes in the United States, which especially affect the inhabitants of Florida, Texas, North Carolina, Louisiana, and South Carolina, in that order.