FEMA Records
25
High volume
Alabama · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Cherokee County, AL
25 FEMA disaster declarations (1974-2024), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Relatively Low. Most common hazard: Severe Storm.
- 25
- FEMA declarations
- 15
- Major disasters
- 63
- NRI risk · Relatively Low
- Severe Storm
- Top hazard
The verdict
Cherokee County has a nationally busy FEMA history: 25 declarations, more than 71% of counties in this registry. But the state comparison tempers that reading: the total is 3% below the Alabama county mean. FEMA's separate National Risk Index places the county in the riskiest 37%; that score models loss and vulnerability rather than counting declarations.
- Riskiest 37%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Relatively Low
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 25
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 27
- NFIP flood insurance claims filed
FEMA's National Risk Index and its declaration registry are separate measures. This county's registry includes Fire Management Assistance (FM) records, which are not presidential disaster declarations, alongside Major Disaster (DR) and Emergency (EM) records.
FEMA OpenFEMA declaration desk
County FIPS 01019 · Cherokee County 25 declarations · rank 895/3,266
DECL-HEAVY · MAJOR-MID · RANK-LOWER · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-LOW · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-BELOW
- DECL-HEAVY 25
- MAJOR-MID 60%
- RANK-LOWER #895
- PHOTO-FINISH Jefferson
- NRI-LOW 63
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Severe Storm
- VS-ST-BELOW -3%
Nearest declaration peer: Jefferson, AR (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · Alabama state profile
Cherokee County among high-volume declaration counties
FEMA declaration records among Cherokee County and nearest peers by total count
- Los Angeles · largest
Los Angeles · largest
88 declarations
- Benton · near 25
Benton · near
25 declarations
- Cherokee · this county 25
Cherokee · this county
25 declarations
- Jefferson · near 25
Jefferson · near
25 declarations
- Lafayette · near 25
Lafayette · near
25 declarations
- Ujelang · smallest 1
Ujelang · smallest
1 declarations
What this shows Cherokee County carries 25 FEMA declaration records, ranked 895 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
Where Cherokee County ranks in the national declaration registry
Cherokee County vs. high-volume counties in this registry
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time · Cherokee County
25 Top 29% higher than 71% 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
Cherokee County's FEMA Risk Index score
Which hazard drives modeled loss here?
FEMA's modeled annual dollar loss for Cherokee County is led by Riverine Flooding (about $9.2M Expected Annual Loss, Historical Loss Ratio Relatively Moderate), while Drought carries the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively Moderate). 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 Cherokee County's hazard record show?
FEMA National Risk Index
This county carries a high composite score on FEMA's National Risk Index, 63.3/100, rated Relatively Low. Its Expected Annual Loss rating is Relatively Low (roughly $16.1M in annualized losses), and a Very High social-vulnerability profile combined with Very Low community resilience shapes how much of that raw exposure becomes realized harm. Among the 18 modeled hazards, Drought carries the county's highest rating, a mid-range Relatively Moderate. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at 32 modeled event-days per year here, based on 1,071 historical events on record.
Reading the federal records together
This county has a small entry in FEMA's NFIP paid-claims table: 27 claims and $386.6K paid in total. PlainHazard calls 1-49 claims a light registry record, a label for this dataset rather than a finding that flood exposure is low. A short claims history can also reflect insurance take-up, the period covered, or losses that were never insured.
Start with the state benchmark: a Alabama county averages 25.8 federal declaration records, while Cherokee County has 25. The gap is 3% 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.
63 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
Cherokee County, AL · 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) High
18/30
25 OpenFEMA declarations, full ingest window (1.2x national county average)
County Disaster Density Moderate
12/25
25 declarations (1.0x state county average of 26)
Major Disaster Share High
15/25
15 of 25 declarations are major disasters (60%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
18/20
7 different disaster types declared in Cherokee County
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Cherokee 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
60%
Major-heavy
NRI risk score
63
Relatively Low
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Cherokee 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Drought | Relatively Moderate | 32 modeled event-days per year |
| Tornado | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 2 years |
| Earthquake | Relatively Low | roughly once every 303 years |
| Riverine Flooding | Relatively Low | roughly once every 1 years |
| Landslide | Relatively Low | roughly once every 2 years |
| Wildfire | Relatively Low | roughly once every 332 years |
| Hurricane | Relatively Low | roughly once every 31 years |
| Cold Wave | Relatively Low | roughly once every 1 years |
| Lightning | Relatively Low | an average of 62 times per year |
| Strong Wind | Relatively Low | an average of 3.6 times per year |
| Heat Wave | Relatively Low | 4.5 modeled event-days per year |
| Ice Storm | Relatively Low | roughly once every 2 years |
| Hail | Very Low | an average of 4.9 times per year |
| Winter Weather | Very Low | an average of 3.7 times per year |
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Modeled annualized frequency; drought and heat wave use event-days/year, December 2025 release
Disaster Types
Severe Storm 11
Hurricane 8
Biological 2
Fire 1
Snowstorm 1
Drought 1
Tornado 1
What Severe Storm declarations mean here
Severe Storm is the most frequent declaration type on Cherokee County's record, 44% 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 - 15 60.0%
of all 25 declarations
Emergency - 9 36.0%
of all 25 declarations
Fire Management - 1 4.0%
of all 25 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 1 | |
| 2021 | 1 | |
| 2020 | 3 | |
| 2019 | 1 | |
| 2017 | 1 | |
| 2016 | 1 | |
| 2011 | 2 | |
| 2008 | 1 | |
| 2005 | 1 | |
| 2004 | 1 | |
| 2003 | 2 | |
| 2002 | 2 | |
| 2001 | 1 | |
| 2000 | 1 | |
| 1996 | 1 | |
Show 5 earlier declaration years
| 1994 | 1 | |
| 1993 | 1 | |
| 1990 | 1 | |
| 1977 | 1 | |
| 1974 | 1 | |
Disaster Declarations
How the 25 FEMA declarations break into federal action codes (DR / EM / FM). Same DISTINCT grain as the table below.
Download these 25 declarations as CSV . FEMA source data is public domain; our derived presentation is CC0.
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3618 | HURRICANE HELENE | EM | Hurricane | 2024-09-26 |
| 4573 | HURRICANE ZETA | DR | Hurricane | 2020-12-10 |
| 3545 | HURRICANE SALLY | EM | Hurricane | 2020-09-14 |
| 4503 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-03-29 |
| 3472 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 4426 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2019-04-17 |
| 3389 | HURRICANE IRMA | EM | Hurricane | 2017-09-11 |
| 4251 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2016-01-21 |
| 1971 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2011-04-28 |
| 3319 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS | EM | Severe Storm | 2011-04-27 |
| 3292 | HURRICANE GUSTAV | EM | Hurricane | 2008-08-30 |
| 3237 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-10 |
| 1549 | HURRICANE IVAN | DR | Hurricane | 2004-09-15 |
| 1466 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2003-05-12 |
| 1442 | SEVERE STORMS AND TORNADOES | DR | Severe Storm | 2002-11-14 |
| 1399 | SEVERE STORMS AND TORNADOES | DR | Severe Storm | 2001-12-07 |
| 2395 | AL - NORTH EAST ALABAMA FIRE COMPLEX - 11/20/2001 | FM | Fire | 2001-11-20 |
| 1352 | SEVERE STORMS AND TORNADOES | DR | Severe Storm | 2000-12-18 |
| 1317 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | DR | Severe Storm | 2000-02-18 |
| 1070 | HURRICANE OPAL | DR | Hurricane | 1995-10-04 |
Show 5 earlier declaration records
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1019 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADO, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 1994-03-30 |
| 3096 | SEVERE SNOWFALL, WINTER STORM | EM | Snowstorm | 1993-03-15 |
| 856 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES & FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 1990-02-17 |
| 3045 | DROUGHT | EM | Drought | 1977-07-20 |
| 422 | TORNADOES | DR | Tornado | 1974-04-04 |
Storm Events in Alabama
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Cherokee County.
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thunderstorm Wind | 7,827 | 16 | 115 | $51.7M |
| Hail | 1,349 | 0 | 0 | $5.0K |
| Flash Flood | 1,047 | 17 | 7 | $12.8M |
| Tornado | 896 | 57 | 343 | $49.7M |
| Drought | 857 | 0 | 0 | $0 |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
NFIP Flood Insurance Claims
Total Claims
27
Total Paid
$386.6K
Avg Per Claim
$14.3K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Relatively Low
Score: 63.3/100
Expected Annual Loss
Relatively Low
$16.1M/year
Social Vulnerability
Very High
Community Resilience
Very Low
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Drought Relatively Moderate
Tornado Relatively Moderate
Earthquake Relatively Low
Riverine Flooding Relatively Low
Landslide Relatively Low
Wildfire Relatively Low
Hurricane Relatively Low
Cold Wave Relatively Low
Lightning Relatively Low
Strong Wind Relatively Low
Heat Wave Relatively Low
Ice Storm Relatively Low
Hail Very Low
Winter Weather 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: Drought
Drought is the slowest of the modeled hazards and the least visible: it does its damage to agriculture, water supply and soil over seasons rather than hours, so it rarely produces the kind of single-day damage that drives a disaster declaration. FEMA scores it in event-days per year rather than discrete events for exactly that reason.
Worth noting for Cherokee County: the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Drought carries the highest modeled rating (Relatively Moderate), 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
Cherokee County's closest FEMA peer: Brown County, TX
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Cherokee County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Cherokee County shows 25 FEMA declarations, led by Severe Storm.
Similar Major-disaster share
Cherokee County: 15 of 25 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Cherokee County: NRI composite 63.3 (Relatively 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 Cherokee County - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for Cherokee 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: 63.3 (Relatively Low).
Similar declaration volume
Nearest out-of-state counties by FEMA declaration count. This county: 25. NRI peers are excluded so the two link sets stay distinct.
Further reading for this county
Most disaster-prone counties
With 25 FEMA declarations, Cherokee County sits in the high-volume declaration band - see how that count ranks against other U.S. counties.
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 Cherokee County?
The most common disaster type in Cherokee County is Severe Storm, with 11 declarations. Other disaster types include Hurricane (8), Biological (2), Fire (1).
How does Cherokee County's FEMA declaration record compare with the Alabama average?
The typical Alabama county has 25.8 FEMA declaration records; Cherokee County has 25, or 3% fewer. Against the national county mean of 20.7, this county's total is 21% higher. The comparison is historical and says nothing about the probability of a future event.
How many major FEMA disaster declarations has Cherokee County received?
Cherokee County has received 15 major disaster declarations, representing 60% of all 25 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has Cherokee County filed?
Cherokee County has 27 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $386.6K in payments, with an average of $14.3K per claim.
Does FEMA's top risk-rated hazard match the highest Expected Annual Loss in Cherokee County?
No. In Cherokee County, Drought has the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively Moderate), while Riverine Flooding leads Expected Annual Loss at about $9.2M. FEMA's risk score and dollar-loss model use different inputs, so the leaders often differ.
What was the worst year for disasters in Cherokee County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Cherokee County was 2020, with 3 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1974 to 2024.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Cherokee County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Cherokee County, Alabama has an overall risk score of 63.3 out of 100 (Relatively Low). The county's social vulnerability rating is Very High and community resilience is Very Low. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Relatively Low, representing $16.1M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Cherokee County?
FEMA's NRI data points to Cherokee County as of the latest release is Drought (risk rating: Relatively Moderate). Other significant hazards include Tornado (Relatively Moderate) and Earthquake (Relatively Low). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts drought here at 32 modeled event-days per year, drawn from 1,071 historical events on record. The underlying methodology weighs historical event frequency against 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 Cherokee County · vintage 2026-08-25 · Methodology · Alabama profile · Verify with FEMA OpenFEMA · Verify with NOAA Storm Events