The FEMA Photo Library is an online gallery of photos compiled by the Federal Emergency Management Agency

Federal Emergency Management Agency

The Federal Emergency Management Agency is an agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security, initially created by Presidential Reorganization Plan No. 1 of 1978 and implemented by two Executive Orders...

 (FEMA) of the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, containing more than 20,000 disaster related photographs taken since 1980. The majority of the collection is of declared disasters and there are also photographs from significant public events that have occurred on or near the National Mall

National Mall

The National Mall is an open-area national park in downtown Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States. The National Mall is a unit of the National Park Service , and is administered by the National Mall and Memorial Parks unit...

 in Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

  Since August 30, 2005, 6,098 images have been added to the collection; Hurricane Katrina

Hurricane Katrina

Hurricane Katrina of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season was a powerful Atlantic hurricane. It is the costliest natural disaster, as well as one of the five deadliest hurricanes, in the history of the United States. Among recorded Atlantic hurricanes, it was the sixth strongest overall...

 has the most photographs in the collection with around 3000 images.

The photographs are of hurricanes, tornado

Tornado

A tornado is a violent, dangerous, rotating column of air that is in contact with both the surface of the earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. They are often referred to as a twister or a cyclone, although the word cyclone is used in meteorology in a wider...

es, flood

Flood

A flood is an overflow of an expanse of water that submerges land. The EU Floods directive defines a flood as a temporary covering by water of land not normally covered by water...

s, typhoons, fire

Fire

Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material in the chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction products. Slower oxidative processes like rusting or digestion are not included by this definition....

s, avalanche

Avalanche

An avalanche is a sudden rapid flow of snow down a slope, occurring when either natural triggers or human activity causes a critical escalating transition from the slow equilibrium evolution of the snow pack. Typically occurring in mountainous terrain, an avalanche can mix air and water with the...

s, ice storm

Ice storm

An ice storm is a type of winter storm characterized by freezing rain, also known as a glaze event or in some parts of the United States as a silver thaw. The U.S. National Weather Service defines an ice storm as a storm which results in the accumulation of at least of ice on exposed surfaces...

s, blizzard

Blizzard

A blizzard is a severe snowstorm characterized by strong winds. By definition, the difference between blizzard and a snowstorm is the strength of the wind. To be a blizzard, a snow storm must have winds in excess of with blowing or drifting snow which reduces visibility to 400 meters or ¼ mile or...

s, terrorist attacks, earthquake

Earthquake

An earthquake is the result of a sudden release of energy in the Earth's crust that creates seismic waves. The seismicity, seismism or seismic activity of an area refers to the frequency, type and size of earthquakes experienced over a period of time...

s, and the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster

Space Shuttle Columbia disaster

The Space Shuttle Columbia disaster occurred on February 1, 2003, when shortly before it was scheduled to conclude its 28th mission, STS-107, the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated over Texas and Louisiana during re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere, resulting in the death of all seven crew members...

.

The subjects of the photographs in the collection:

• FEMA and other disaster workers (Urban Search and Rescue, Disaster Medical Assistance Teams, the National Guard
  United States National Guard
  The National Guard of the United States is a reserve military force composed of state National Guard militia members or units under federally recognized active or inactive armed force service for the United States. Militia members are citizen soldiers, meaning they work part time for the National...
  
  , Red Cross, US Army Corps of Engineers, US Forest Service, Internal Revenue Service
  Internal Revenue Service
  The Internal Revenue Service is the revenue service of the United States federal government. The agency is a bureau of the Department of the Treasury, and is under the immediate direction of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue...
  
  , and State disaster workers) searching for and/or helping disaster victims.
• Photographs of damage to private property and public infrastructure.
• Photographs of FEMA success stories where a modification to a building or house lessened the damage from a natural disaster.
• Photographs of training.
• Photographs of FEMA provided housing for displaced disaster victims.
• Photographs of elected or appointed officials surveying the disaster and providing support to disaster workers and victims.

These photographs are in the public domain

Public domain

Works are in the public domain if the intellectual property rights have expired, if the intellectual property rights are forfeited, or if they are not covered by intellectual property rights at all...

 and are not copyright

Copyright

Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...

ed, and the collection is added to during declared disasters when multiple additions occur daily.