Impactful Weather and Multi-Hazard Events: Lived Experiences From Rural Scotland

Abstract

Weather and climate events—such as storms, extreme winds, heatwaves and droughts—can have profound impacts on society and the environment, causing significant disruptions to daily life and economic losses across a range of sectors like agriculture, fisheries, forestry, and tourism. Furthermore, multi-hazard events, where hazards such as heavy rainfall and high winds interact, can exacerbate these impacts through simultaneous, cascading and cumulative effects. While global frameworks such as the Sendai Framework emphasise the importance of multi-hazard thinking, evidence on the real-world impacts and lived experiences of such events remains limited—particularly in rural contexts. This study addresses this gap by exploring lived experiences in Scottish rural areas, focusing on: (1) weather and multi-hazard events with significant impacts, (2) management policies and practices currently in place, and (3) stakeholders’ future concerns regarding the anticipated increase in multi-hazard events, as well as strategies to mitigate their impacts. Drawing on lived experiences and insights from 43 survey respondents and 12 follow-up interviews, findings reveal growing concern over the increasing frequency and severity of multi-hazard events, including cascading winter storms and hot and dry summer conditions. The results also highlight persistent challenges such as limited cross-sectoral coordination and a lack of tailored resources for rural areas, even though existing governance frameworks and community-led initiatives offer some support. This study sheds light on the importance of integrating local knowledge into multi-hazard research and risk management and calls for policy adaptation that reflects the specific needs of rural communities. By enabling future research to align with stakeholder-driven insights, this work provides a foundation for strengthening Scotland's resilience to weather and multi-hazard events, and a mixed-methods research framework that is applicable to other regions internationally.