Change the Flash Flood Warning Polygon Color

Flash Flood warnings are being ignored and it is costing lives. Part of that is the color of the polygon.

When was the last time you were under a tornado warning? I’m guessing you could probably give a general idea of when that was if not down to the very day.

When was the last time you were in a severe thunderstorm warning? I’m guessing you could also give a pretty good idea of when that was as well.

Now when was the last time you were under a flash flood warning? I would put good money down that the vast majority of you have no idea when that was. Many of you likely have been under a flash flood warning this year, numerous times, and flat out ignored it. There have been more flash flood warnings issued this year, 3,100 of them up to today July 18, 2025, than any year before.

Flash flood warnings are routinely ignored throughout the United States. Now there are a number of reasons for that, but the one I want to focus on is one I don’t think people have considered. The color of the polygon.

Now on its face, this feels ridiculous. Why would a color of a box on a radar or map matter? Why wouldn’t you click on it to read it?

But they are colored for a reason. It is to give you an idea of what to expect and what your warning is. Which is understandable because you should be able to look at something and say yes, that is a tornado warning, yes that is a severe thunderstorm warning, etc.

But there’s a separate issue that is I think frequently overlooked. If you look at this screenshot below from a radar scan of Wisconsin a few days ago, rank these in order of how concerning they would be.

If you’re like most people, you’re going to immediately be drawn to the red color, then the yellow, then the green. Our brains have been conditioned to see red as bad, yellow as caution, green as safe. Even if you don’t know what these colors mean, had never seen a warning on the radar in your life, your immediate attention is drawn to the red area and the yellow areas because we have been conditioned to see them as the major bad things.

But as we all know by now, flash flooding can and does claim a lot of lives and can be just as deadly as tornados and severe storms. In fact, flash flooding is the leading cause of storm deaths in the United States. A catastrophic flash flood just occurred in Texas that claimed 135 people on July 4th with a number still missing. And one of the major issues with that particular flood as you can read in my article below.

But aside from late issuance of warnings by Kerr County officials, man of the actual on time warnings of the National Weather Service were ignored by people in the area. Now part of that is going to be because it was at 1 am when many people were asleep. But the other part of it very well could be that they are subconsciously dismissing them because they see the color green and immediately think things are fine. They are safe.

For evacuations of wildfires and hurricanes, green is often the color that is used to indicate when you may need to prepare but not yet evacuate. You are furthest from the issue and at the time are safe. (Except for a few states, looking at you Arizona, New Mexico, and Nevada which you can read about below.)

So what is the solution here?

Change the color of flash flood warnings. Make it something much more alarm worthy. Completely remove it from the connotation that things are safe.

I’ve taken the liberty of suggesting a color below. Some kind of magenta.

You can see the flood warnings were changed from green to a magenta color. It draws the eye more and feels much more risky. It’s a simple change but it makes it much more likely someone will pay attention to it.

We have to do something. What we’re currently doing is clearly not working. It’s time to change.