Pakistan, June 20 -- Nine deaths in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa after heavy rain and strong winds are now part of an all-too-familiar national ledger: a collapsed roof in one district, a broken wall in another, a warning issued in time but not always in time to save those living under weak structures, beside unstable slopes or along drainage lines that local authorities have long known to be dangerous.

The latest fatalities have come even before the monsoon fully settled in, while the provincial disaster authority was warning of flash floods, landslides and possible glacial lake outburst floods in upper KP, and the Met Office was cautioning that heavy rain could trigger urban flooding in parts of Punjab. That the spectre of risk now runs in every...