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Residents living in older mobile and manufactured homes face a greater risk of destruction, and measures must be taken to mitigate the risks, experts have warned, amid a nearly 100 percent chance of a very strong El Niño forecast this year.
People in mobile homes are 15 to 20 times more likely to die in a tornado than those in permanent homes, according to the National Weather Service. On average, 72 percent of all tornado-related fatalities are in homes, with 54 percent of these deaths being in mobile homes.
Florida reportedly has more manufactured homes than any other state, amounting to nearly 830,000, based on U.S. Census data. However, it’s said to be unknown exactly how many of these homes predate the safer building standards that were introduced in 1994, which required manufactured homes in Florida to be built to withstand stronger winds. The manufactured-housing industry estimates the number of homes built before the recent building codes to be around 600,000, according to a report by Inside Climate News.
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Nearly 700,000 of Florida's more than 1 million mobile and manufactured homes aren't built to withstand today's storms, with nearly a quarter million constructed before the federal government regulated these homes, according to a report by Florida’s WPTV in West Palm Beach.
"You're looking at roughly half a million people that are over 70 years old living in mobile and manufactured homes that may be vulnerable," Jim Ayotte, the former head of the Florida Manufactured Housing Association, told WPTV in May.
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Some residents have expressed fears ahead of El Niño, which is reported to be strengthening, “with a greater than 90 percent chance of a very strong event during the Northern Hemisphere fall and winter 2026-27,” the Climate Prediction Center of the National Weather Service warned in a report earlier this month.
Paula Richards and Mike Powers in St. Lucie County, Florida, get to enjoy their manufactured home seven months out of the year. They told WPTV in May: "From June to the end of November, we live in fear.”
Back in October 2024, a tornado ripped through the Fort Pierce area hours ahead of Hurricane Milton. "We lost 138 homes, six of our friends were killed," Barry Lamb, another resident, told WPTV.
El Niño is one of two opposite climate patterns in the Pacific Ocean (the other being La Niña) that go against normal trade wind conditions. The two phenomena together are known as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) cycle. Trade winds are prevailing winds that circle the Earth near the equator.
“During El Niño, trade winds weaken. Warm water is pushed back east, toward the west coast of the Americas,” the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) explains.
Meteorologist and hurricane specialist Athena Masson, who is a professor at Flagler College in St. Augustine, Florida, told Newsweek that what makes this year’s El Niño so strong is that sea surface temperatures in the Pacific are showing record-breaking values, with “some locations even seeing 8 degrees Celsius above average in the Pacific.”
Masson said that outside the ENSO cycle, “the climate is warming, as a whole,” noting that with warmer temperatures, we can experience an increased amount of evaporation and water in our atmosphere. ENSO may help to fuel this in some locations, such as in the Pacific, “with all of the tropical systems occurring out there," she added.
The meteorologist said: “While more data still needs to be collected...even in these areas that are forecasting cooler winters because of an El Niño, they are still much warmer compared to past El Niño events. Our climate may continue to warm steadily year-by- year, and this could alter ENSO in future years.”
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Residents of Older Homes Face ‘Severe’ Risk
El Niño shifts Florida’s typical dry season from calm and dry to unusually stormy conditions, bringing strong winds, tornadoes, heavy rainfall and flooding. Such conditions can “put significant stress on structures, especially those that are not designed up to code,” Florida-based engineering professor and coastal protections expert Landolf Rhode-Barbarigos from the University of Miami told Newsweek.
Residents in older, pre-1994 manufactured homes face “a greater risk of severe structural damage compared to those in newer manufactured homes or conventional houses,” he warned.
Built under older manufactured home construction and safety standards from the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), these homes typically have lighter framing, weaker wall-to-roof connections, and shallower tie-down systems that can easily lose effectiveness once heavy rains saturate the soil, the professor explained.
According to post-storm analyses conducted by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), pre-1994 homes were found to have nearly “10 times the probability of structural failure under high wind loads compared to more modern engineering standards,” Rhode-Barbarigos noted.
The professor warned that Florida's lack of precise data on older manufactured homes makes it difficult for emergency officials to identify the structures most at risk during severe weather and for local authorities to issue the most effective evacuation orders as well as provide the proper resources and deploy search-and-rescue teams to the hardest-hit communities.
According to Masson, these older homes are still prevalent, especially in parts of central and north Florida. While the chances are higher that these older structures will experience more damage compared to newer buildings during extreme weather, “this is still dependent upon the area and the type of event,” she said.
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What Homeowners and Local Authorities Can Do To Reduce Risks
Rhode-Barbarigos said the key is “knowing where vulnerabilities exist and addressing them before severe weather arrives.”
He advises residents to thoroughly inspect their homes, including ground anchors, carports, and awnings, as these can become vulnerable in high winds and damage the home.
Homeowners should also secure loose yard debris, "since virtually anything can become a projectile in high winds,” while those unsure about their home’s structural condition should consult a professional engineer or local building official, the professor said.
“Mobile home park managers should trim hazardous tree branches, clear drainage systems, inspect utility connections, and assess whether any on-site facility can serve as a designated shelter,” Rhode-Barbarigos said, adding that “they should also warn residents about mobile home vulnerabilities in high winds and provide information on home-hardening measures.”
Given the extended wet season, Masson said homeowners and local officials should prepare for the possibility of increased flooding. Residents should establish whether their home is in a flood zone. Information on the location of these flood-prone areas can be seen at the website of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
Tara Goode is the vice president at the weather tech company Climavision, which is a partner of the NOAA, and the company's data feeds the National Weather Service.
Goode told Newsweek that many of Florida's manufactured and mobile homes sit within weather radar gaps, which are areas where the federal weather radar network has limited visibility into what's happening close to the ground.
She warned: “This leaves a major data blind spot," meaning "the tool directly responsible for getting warnings to these vulnerable areas can’t actually see what’s happening and so tornadoes, or other severe weather, can form without any warning at all.”
Goode advised residents to be aware of where the weather radar gaps are. “If a community is in a weather radar gap, an area 60+ miles away from the nearest national weather service radar, they are vulnerable to missed or late warnings, unless a gap-filling weather radar has been installed,” she said.
When a home has no secure shelter nearby, “warning time is the safety plan,” and this matters most for older residents or those with mobility issues who may need more time to get out of harm’s way.
Newsweek has contacted the Florida Manufactured Housing Association, the Florida Housing Coalition, the Florida Division of Emergency Management, and the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles for comment via email.
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Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Sirena Bergman and Emma Lee-Sang
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