Globally, it is believed that people’spreparedness to immediately recover from disaster is a panacea to a sustainable risk management, considering the increase level of disaster hazards as well as breakthrough in scientific and technological advancements. Disaster impacts and risks can be reduced along with increasing peoples’ preparedness towards hazards however the extent of this cannot be ascertained in metropolitan cities in Nigeria. In this regard therefore, this study evaluates the level of disaster preparedness as measures to sustainable risk management in metropolitan cities in selected NorthCentral states in Nigeria, that are highly flood-prone as a result of Rivers Benue and Niger. In achieving this, a qualitative approach with use of field observations and data obtained through responses to questionnaires were utilized. The results of the study reveals that there is a low level of disaster preparedness to flood risks management and the factors responsibleare the low level of communities’ social capital; risks knowledge capacities and; the reduced involvement of local and state governments’institutions. This study therefore concludes that communities’ preparedness played key rolesinreducing flood disastersand improving sustainable risks management. It is therefore recommended that governments’ institutions charged with environmental issues should orient the flood prone communities on how to prepare for flood disasters in areas of responses, resilience and recovery

Keywords : Disaster preparedness, community, flood disaster, risk management.