FEMA Records
14
Low volume
Kansas · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Allen County, KS
14 FEMA disaster declarations (1969-2024), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Very Low. Most common hazard: Severe Storm.
- 14
- FEMA declarations
- 10
- Major disasters
- 15
- NRI risk · Very Low
- Severe Storm
- Top hazard
The verdict
Allen County has a nationally busy FEMA history: 14 declarations, more than 20% of counties in this registry. But the state comparison tempers that reading: the total is 22% below the Kansas county mean. FEMA's separate National Risk Index places the county safer than 15%; that score models loss and vulnerability rather than counting declarations.
- Safer than 15%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Very Low
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 14
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 91
- NFIP flood insurance claims filed
FEMA's National Risk Index and its declaration registry are separate measures. This county's registry includes Major Disaster (DR) and Emergency (EM) records; an EM authorizes a narrower set of federal assistance than a DR.
FEMA OpenFEMA declaration desk
County FIPS 20001 · Allen County 14 declarations · rank 2539/3,266
DECL-MID · MAJOR-MID · RANK-LOWER · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-LOW · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-BELOW
- DECL-MID 14
- MAJOR-MID 71%
- RANK-LOWER #2,539
- PHOTO-FINISH Pulaski
- NRI-LOW Very Low
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Severe Storm
- VS-ST-BELOW -22%
Nearest declaration peer: Pulaski, IL (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · Kansas state profile
Allen County among counties with fewer federal records
FEMA declaration records among Allen County and nearest peers by total count
- Los Angeles · largest
Los Angeles · largest
88 declarations
- Allen · this county 14
Allen · this county
14 declarations
- Franklin (city) · near 14
Franklin (city) · near
14 declarations
- Harris · near 14
Harris · near
14 declarations
- Pulaski · near 14
Pulaski · near
14 declarations
- Ujelang · smallest 1
Ujelang · smallest
1 declarations
What this shows Allen County carries 14 FEMA declaration records, ranked 2539 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
Allen County versus quieter counties in this dataset
Allen County among lower-declaration counties nationally
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time · Allen County
14 20th percentile higher than 20% of 3,266 counties
Each bar is a band; taller bars hold more counties. The dashed line + filled bar mark this entry. Hover or tap any bar for its full count, share, and where it sits relative to this entry.
Source FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 · 2026-08-25
Allen County's FEMA Risk Index score
Which hazard drives modeled loss here?
FEMA's modeled annual dollar loss for Allen County is led by Riverine Flooding (about $3.9M Expected Annual Loss, Historical Loss Ratio Relatively Moderate), while Winter Weather carries the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively Low). EAL and risk score use different inputs; they need not agree.
Source: FEMA National Risk Index (December 2025 release) - Expected Annual Loss vs composite risk rating by hazard.
What does Allen County's hazard record show?
Reading the federal records together
The NFIP claims register shows a middle-volume loss record here: 91 paid claims, totaling $3.3M. PlainHazard uses 50-499 claims for this descriptive band; FEMA does not publish it as a safety or coverage category. The $36.8K average describes payments on recorded claims only, leaving uninsured damage and properties without a claim outside the measure.
Start with the state benchmark: a Kansas county averages 18.0 federal declaration records, while Allen County has 14. The gap is 22% below that mean. Fewer entries indicate a quieter history of recorded federal actions, not immunity from a hazard and not a prediction about what happens next.
FEMA National Risk Index
This county's FEMA National Risk Index composite lands at 15.3/100 (Very Low), a modest reading against the rest of the country. Expected Annual Loss is rated Very Low (roughly $7.7M in annualized losses), tempered or compounded by a Very Low social-vulnerability score and Relatively Moderate community-resilience score. Even the county's top-rated hazard, Winter Weather, only reaches Relatively Low on FEMA's scale, none of the 18 modeled hazards stand out here. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at an average of 9.6 times per year here, based on 183 historical events on record.
53 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
Allen County, KS · PlainHazard-derived composite from federal records
This 0–100 index is an explicit PlainHazard composite from FEMA declaration history only on the county surface (this DB has no county-level NOAA damage row) . It is not FEMA's National Risk Index, not a forecast, and not a safety, insurance, or preparedness rating. Open the calculator · Methodology
FEMA Declarations (1953–present) Moderate
10/30
14 OpenFEMA declarations, full ingest window (0.7x national county average)
County Disaster Density Moderate
10/25
14 declarations (0.8x state county average of 18)
Major Disaster Share High
18/25
10 of 14 declarations are major disasters (71%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
15/20
6 different disaster types declared in Allen County
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Allen County
How to read this radar
Each axis: NRI risk rating (Very Low-Very High) on a 0-100 scale. Rounder = broad exposure; spiky = one or two hazards dominate.
Major Disaster share
71%
Major-heavy
NRI risk score
15
Very Low
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Allen County?
FEMA's National Risk Index models a historical event count and an annualized frequency for each hazard type. Most hazards are expressed as modeled occurrences per year; FEMA expresses drought and heat-wave frequency as event-days per year. These modeled frequencies are not forecasts.
| Hazard | NRI Risk Rating | Recurrence |
|---|---|---|
| Winter Weather | Relatively Low | an average of 9.6 times per year |
| Ice Storm | Relatively Low | roughly once every 3 years |
| Drought | Relatively Low | 17 modeled event-days per year |
| Heat Wave | Relatively Low | 15 modeled event-days per year |
| Lightning | Relatively Low | an average of 54 times per year |
| Strong Wind | Relatively Low | an average of 5.2 times per year |
| Hail | Relatively Low | an average of 6.6 times per year |
| Tornado | Relatively Low | roughly once every 3 years |
| Cold Wave | Relatively Low | an average of 1.6 times per year |
| Earthquake | Very Low | roughly once every 943 years |
| Riverine Flooding | Very Low | an average of 1.7 times per year |
| Wildfire | Very Low | roughly once every 1,574 years |
| Hurricane | Very Low | roughly once every 100 years |
| Landslide | Very Low | roughly once every 15 years |
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Modeled annualized frequency; drought and heat wave use event-days/year, December 2025 release
Disaster Types
Severe Storm 8
Biological 2
Hurricane 1
Severe Ice Storm 1
Flood 1
Tornado 1
What Severe Storm declarations mean here
Severe Storm is the most frequent declaration type on Allen County's record, 57% of its declarations. In FEMA's vocabulary this covers convective weather: thunderstorm straight-line winds, large hail, and the multi-day outbreaks that often carry embedded tornadoes. Activity is heaviest in spring and summer, though the season varies by region.
These events behave differently from a hurricane on paper. Damage tends to be distributed along a storm track rather than concentrated on a coastline, and a declaration typically follows an outbreak that crossed several counties over a few days, not a single point of impact. Because the qualifying threshold is the cost of uninsured public and individual losses rather than storm intensity, two similar storms can produce a declaration in one year and none in another.
Declaration counts describe past federal action. They are a record of what was declared, not a forecast of future hazard probability.
Declaration Types
What DR / EM / FM mean
FEMA categorizes declarations as Major Disasters (DR), Emergencies (EM), or Fire Management Assistance (FM).
Major Disaster - 10 71.4%
of all 14 declarations
Emergency - 4 28.6%
of all 14 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 2 | |
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2019 | 2 | |
| 2010 | 1 | |
| 2008 | 1 | |
| 2007 | 1 | |
| 2005 | 1 | |
| 2003 | 1 | |
| 2002 | 1 | |
| 1987 | 1 | |
| 1969 | 1 | |
Disaster Declarations
How the 14 FEMA declarations break into federal action codes (DR / EM / FM). Same DISTINCT grain as the table below.
Download these 14 declarations as CSV . FEMA source data is public domain; our derived presentation is CC0.
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4800 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2024-07-15 |
| 4747 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2023-10-26 |
| 4504 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-03-29 |
| 3481 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 4449 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, FLOODING,LANDSLIDES,AND MUDSLIDES | DR | Severe Storm | 2019-06-20 |
| 3412 | TORNADOES AND FLOODING | EM | Severe Storm | 2019-05-28 |
| 1885 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS AND SNOWSTORM | DR | Severe Storm | 2010-03-09 |
| 3282 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | EM | Severe Storm | 2007-12-12 |
| 1711 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2007-07-02 |
| 3236 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-10 |
| 1462 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2003-05-06 |
| 1402 | SEVERE WINTER ICE STORM | DR | Severe Ice Storm | 2002-02-06 |
| 780 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1986-10-22 |
| 267 | TORNADOES, SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Tornado | 1969-07-15 |
Storm Events in Kansas
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Allen County.
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hail | 8,265 | 0 | 9 | $24.2M |
| Thunderstorm Wind | 7,987 | 3 | 34 | $30.6M |
| High Wind | 1,553 | 1 | 7 | $10.2M |
| Drought | 1,272 | 0 | 0 | $0 |
| Flash Flood | 1,037 | 6 | 9 | $35.9M |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
NFIP Flood Insurance Claims
Total Claims
91
Total Paid
$3.3M
Avg Per Claim
$36.8K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Very Low
Score: 15.3/100
Expected Annual Loss
Very Low
$7.7M/year
Social Vulnerability
Very Low
Community Resilience
Relatively Moderate
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Winter Weather Relatively Low
Ice Storm Relatively Low
Drought Relatively Low
Heat Wave Relatively Low
Lightning Relatively Low
Strong Wind Relatively Low
Hail Relatively Low
Tornado Relatively Low
Cold Wave Relatively Low
Earthquake Very Low
Riverine Flooding Very Low
Wildfire Very Low
Hurricane Very Low
Landslide Very Low
Source: FEMA National Risk Index (NRI) Ratings reflect relative scores among all US counties. Data: hazards.fema.gov/nri
The model's sharpest exposure here: Winter Weather
Winter Weather in the model means the accumulation of snow and cold that disrupts rather than destroys: road closures, roof loads, burst pipes and lost heating. Its costs land heavily on transport and on households least able to absorb an interruption.
Worth noting for Allen County: the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Winter Weather carries the highest modeled rating (Relatively Low), while the county's declaration history is led by Severe Storm. That is not a contradiction, the two measure genuinely different things. Declarations record federal ACTION, which requires damage costly enough to exceed state and local capacity; the Risk Index models EXPECTED annual loss across all 18 hazards whether or not any declaration ever followed. A hazard can be the county's largest modeled exposure and never once have driven a declaration.
National Risk Index ratings are modeled estimates of expected annual loss, not predictions of what will happen in any given year.
Data-matched county comparisons
Allen County's closest FEMA peer: Washington County, WI
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Allen County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Allen County shows 14 FEMA declarations, led by Severe Storm.
Similar Major-disaster share
Allen County: 10 of 14 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Allen County: NRI composite 15.3 (Very Low).
How these peers are chosen
Cohort: Published U.S. county equivalents outside the source state or territory. Each metric keeps six ETL candidates; three unique destinations are shown after de-duplicating across axes. Declaration-volume ranking combines count and Major-disaster share and prefers a different leading incident type; Major-share ranks the Major fraction adjusted for volume; NRI ranks the modeled composite score only.
Retained FEMA snapshot feed for Allen County - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for Allen County: nearest out-of-state National Risk Index composite and nearest FEMA declaration count (floor ≥5 records). Record similarity only, not a forecast of the next hazard.
Similar NRI composite
Nearest out-of-state counties by FEMA NRI score. This county: 15.3 (Very Low).
Similar declaration volume
Nearest out-of-state counties by FEMA declaration count. This county: 14. NRI peers are excluded so the two link sets stay distinct.
Further reading for this county
Understanding disaster data
Allen County's NFIP claims file (91 claims) and FEMA declaration history measure different federal records - this guide separates them from modeled NRI risk.
More PlainHazard guides
- Most disaster-prone counties - U.S. counties ranked by FEMA declaration totals.
- Understanding disaster data - declarations vs storm events vs NRI scores.
- Preparing for natural disasters - household checklist (not county-specific advice).
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the most common disaster type in Allen County?
The most common disaster type in Allen County is Severe Storm, with 8 declarations. Other disaster types include Biological (2), Hurricane (1), Severe Ice Storm (1).
How does Allen County's FEMA declaration record compare with the Kansas average?
The typical Kansas county has 18.0 FEMA declaration records; Allen County has 14, or 22% fewer. Against the national county mean of 20.7, this county's total is 32% lower. The comparison is historical and says nothing about the probability of a future event.
How many major FEMA disaster declarations has Allen County received?
Allen County has received 10 major disaster declarations, representing 71% of all 14 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has Allen County filed?
Allen County has 91 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $3.3M in payments, with an average of $36.8K per claim.
Does FEMA's top risk-rated hazard match the highest Expected Annual Loss in Allen County?
No. In Allen County, Winter Weather has the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively Low), while Riverine Flooding leads Expected Annual Loss at about $3.9M. FEMA's risk score and dollar-loss model use different inputs, so the leaders often differ.
What was the worst year for disasters in Allen County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Allen County was 2019, with 2 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1969 to 2024.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Allen County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Allen County, Kansas has an overall risk score of 15.3 out of 100 (Very Low). On social vulnerability the county rates Very Low; on community resilience, Relatively Moderate. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Very Low, representing $7.7M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Allen County?
The top hazard flagged by FEMA's NRI for Allen County is Winter Weather (risk rating: Relatively Low). Other significant hazards include Ice Storm (Relatively Low) and Drought (Relatively Low). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts winter weather here at an average of 9.6 times per year, drawn from 183 historical events on record. These scores are based on FEMA's analysis of historical event frequency, exposed assets, and community vulnerability.
Data Sources & Methodology
Disaster declaration data comes from the FEMA OpenFEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 API, which includes all federally declared disasters, emergencies, and fire management assistance grants.
Storm event data is sourced from the NOAA Storm Events Database (2015-2025), which tracks significant weather events including thunderstorms, tornadoes, floods, and winter storms.
Flood insurance data comes from the FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA claims dataset.
This data is provided for informational purposes only. FEMA disaster declarations represent federal response actions and may not capture all local emergencies or weather events.
FEMA OpenFEMA declarations + NRI for Allen County · vintage 2026-08-25 · Methodology · Kansas profile · Verify with FEMA OpenFEMA · Verify with NOAA Storm Events