FEMA Records
22
Above median
Missouri · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
DeKalb County, MO
22 FEMA disaster declarations (1965-2020), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Very Low. Most common hazard: Severe Storm.
- 22
- FEMA declarations
- 16
- Major disasters
- 16
- NRI risk · Very Low
- Severe Storm
- Top hazard
The verdict
DeKalb County has a nationally busy FEMA history: 22 declarations, more than 57% of counties in this registry. But the state comparison tempers that reading: the total is 11% below the Missouri county mean. FEMA's separate National Risk Index places the county safer than 16%; that score models loss and vulnerability rather than counting declarations.
- Safer than 16%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Very Low
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 22
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 6
- 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 29063 · DeKalb County 22 declarations · rank 1300/3,266
DECL-HEAVY · MAJOR-MID · RANK-LOWER · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-LOW · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-BELOW
- DECL-HEAVY 22
- MAJOR-MID 73%
- RANK-LOWER #1,300
- PHOTO-FINISH Hardy
- NRI-LOW Very Low
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Severe Storm
- VS-ST-BELOW -11%
Nearest declaration peer: Hardy, WV (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · Missouri state profile
DeKalb County in the declaration-count neighbourhood
FEMA declaration records among this county and nearest peers
- Los Angeles · largest
Los Angeles · largest
88 declarations
- DeKalb · this county 22
DeKalb · this county
22 declarations
- Hardy · near 22
Hardy · near
22 declarations
- Prairie · near 22
Prairie · near
22 declarations
- St. Francis · near 22
St. Francis · near
22 declarations
- Ujelang · smallest 1
Ujelang · smallest
1 declarations
What this shows DeKalb County carries 22 FEMA declaration records, ranked 1300 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
How does DeKalb County compare?
DeKalb County vs. all counties in this dataset
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time
22 Top 43% higher than 57% 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 · 2026-08-03
DeKalb County's FEMA Risk Index score
Which hazard drives modeled loss here?
FEMA's modeled annual dollar loss for DeKalb County is led by Riverine Flooding (about $3.1M Expected Annual Loss, Historical Loss Ratio Relatively High), 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 DeKalb County's hazard record show?
FEMA National Risk Index
This county's FEMA National Risk Index composite lands at 16.0/100 (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. 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 22 modeled event-days per year here, based on 567 historical events on record.
Reading the federal records together
This county has a small entry in FEMA's NFIP paid-claims table: 6 claims and $99.1K 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 Missouri county averages 24.6 federal declaration records, while DeKalb County has 22. The gap is 11% 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.
60 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
DeKalb County, MO · 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
16/30
22 OpenFEMA declarations, full ingest window (1.1x national county average)
County Disaster Density Moderate
11/25
22 declarations (0.9x state county average of 25)
Major Disaster Share High
18/25
16 of 22 declarations are major disasters (73%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
15/20
6 different disaster types declared in DeKalb County
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - DeKalb 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
73%
Major-heavy
NRI risk score
16
Very Low
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike DeKalb 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 | 22 modeled event-days per year |
| Tornado | Relatively Low | roughly once every 4 years |
| Hail | Relatively Low | an average of 6.4 times per year |
| Landslide | Very Low | roughly once every 9 years |
| Wildfire | Very Low | roughly once every 1,185 years |
| Heat Wave | Relatively Low | 9.9 modeled event-days per year |
| Cold Wave | Relatively Low | an average of 3.8 times per year |
| Ice Storm | Relatively Low | roughly once every 2 years |
| Strong Wind | Relatively Low | an average of 4.7 times per year |
| Earthquake | Very Low | roughly once every 1,085 years |
| Riverine Flooding | Very Low | roughly once every 2 years |
| Winter Weather | Very Low | an average of 11 times per year |
| Lightning | Very Low | an average of 47 times per year |
| Hurricane | No Rating | roughly once every 219 years |
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Modeled annualized frequency; drought and heat wave use event-days/year, December 2025 release
Disaster Types
Severe Storm 10
Severe Ice Storm 4
Flood 4
Biological 2
Hurricane 1
Drought 1
What Severe Storm declarations mean here
Severe Storm is the most frequent declaration type on DeKalb County's record, 45% 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 - 16 72.7%
of all 22 declarations
Emergency - 6 27.3%
of all 22 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2015 | 1 | |
| 2011 | 2 | |
| 2010 | 1 | |
| 2009 | 1 | |
| 2008 | 2 | |
| 2007 | 1 | |
| 2005 | 1 | |
| 2004 | 1 | |
| 2002 | 2 | |
| 1999 | 1 | |
| 1995 | 1 | |
| 1993 | 1 | |
| 1984 | 1 | |
| 1976 | 1 | |
Show 3 earlier declaration years
| 1974 | 1 | |
| 1973 | 1 | |
| 1965 | 1 | |
Disaster Declarations
How the 22 FEMA declarations break into federal action codes (DR / EM / FM). Same DISTINCT grain as the table below.
Download these 22 declarations as CSV . FEMA source data is public domain; our derived presentation is CC0.
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4490 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-03-26 |
| 3482 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 4238 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2015-08-07 |
| 1961 | SEVERE WINTER STORM AND SNOWSTORM | DR | Severe Storm | 2011-03-23 |
| 3317 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | EM | Severe Storm | 2011-02-03 |
| 1934 | SEVERE STORMS, FLOODING, AND TORNADOES | DR | Severe Storm | 2010-08-17 |
| 3303 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | EM | Severe Ice Storm | 2009-01-30 |
| 1736 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | DR | Severe Ice Storm | 2007-12-27 |
| 3281 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | EM | Severe Ice Storm | 2007-12-12 |
| 1708 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2007-06-11 |
| 3232 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-10 |
| 1524 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2004-06-11 |
| 1412 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2002-05-06 |
| 1403 | SEVERE WINTER ICE STORM | DR | Severe Ice Storm | 2002-02-06 |
| 1253 | SEVERE STORMS, FLOODING AND TORNADOES | DR | Severe Storm | 1998-10-14 |
| 1054 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, HAIL, FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 1995-06-02 |
| 995 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1993-07-09 |
| 713 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1984-06-21 |
| 3017 | DROUGHT | EM | Drought | 1976-09-24 |
| 407 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1973-11-01 |
Show 2 earlier declaration records
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 372 | HEAVY RAINS, TORNADOES & FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 1973-04-19 |
| 203 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1965-07-27 |
Storm Events in Missouri
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to DeKalb County.
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thunderstorm Wind | 6,391 | 30 | 52 | $63.4M |
| Hail | 4,411 | 0 | 1 | $86.1M |
| Flash Flood | 2,399 | 47 | 14 | $406.6M |
| Flood | 1,810 | 25 | 7 | $304.6M |
| Drought | 1,033 | 0 | 350 | $53.6M |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
NFIP Flood Insurance Claims
Total Claims
6
Total Paid
$99.1K
Avg Per Claim
$16.5K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Very Low
Score: 16.0/100
Expected Annual Loss
Very Low
$7.7M/year
Social Vulnerability
Very Low
Community Resilience
Relatively Moderate
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Drought Relatively Moderate
Tornado Relatively Low
Hail Relatively Low
Landslide Very Low
Wildfire Very Low
Heat Wave Relatively Low
Cold Wave Relatively Low
Ice Storm Relatively Low
Strong Wind Relatively Low
Earthquake Very Low
Riverine Flooding Very Low
Winter Weather Very Low
Lightning Very Low
Hurricane No Rating
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 DeKalb 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
DeKalb County's closest FEMA peer: Randolph County, WV
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for DeKalb County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
DeKalb County shows 22 FEMA declarations, led by Severe Storm.
Similar Major-disaster share
DeKalb County: 16 of 22 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
DeKalb County: NRI composite 16.0 (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 DeKalb County - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for DeKalb 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: 16.0 (Very Low).
Similar declaration volume
Nearest out-of-state counties by FEMA declaration count. This county: 22. NRI peers are excluded so the two link sets stay distinct.
Further reading for this county
Most disaster-prone counties
With 22 FEMA declarations, DeKalb 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 DeKalb County?
The most common disaster type in DeKalb County is Severe Storm, with 10 declarations. Other disaster types include Severe Ice Storm (4), Flood (4), Biological (2).
How does DeKalb County's FEMA declaration record compare with the Missouri average?
The typical Missouri county has 24.6 FEMA declaration records; DeKalb County has 22, or 11% fewer. Against the national county mean of 20.7, this county's total is 6% higher. The comparison is historical and says nothing about the probability of a future event.
How many major FEMA disaster declarations has DeKalb County received?
DeKalb County has received 16 major disaster declarations, representing 73% of all 22 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has DeKalb County filed?
DeKalb County has 6 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $99.1K in payments, with an average of $16.5K per claim.
Does FEMA's top risk-rated hazard match the highest Expected Annual Loss in DeKalb County?
No. In DeKalb County, Drought has the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively Moderate), while Riverine Flooding leads Expected Annual Loss at about $3.1M. FEMA's risk score and dollar-loss model use different inputs, so the leaders often differ.
What was the worst year for disasters in DeKalb County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in DeKalb County was 2002, with 2 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1965 to 2020.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for DeKalb County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, DeKalb County, Missouri has an overall risk score of 16.0 out of 100 (Very Low). The county's social vulnerability rating is Very Low and community resilience is 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 DeKalb County?
The top hazard flagged by FEMA's NRI for DeKalb County as of the latest release is Drought (risk rating: Relatively Moderate). Other significant hazards include Tornado (Relatively Low) and Hail (Relatively Low). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts drought here at 22 modeled event-days per year, drawn from 567 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.
PlainHazard derives this profile from FEMA's Disaster Declarations Summaries and National Risk Index data. The declaration comparison covers 3,266 U.S. counties and county equivalents in this database, refreshed as of 2026-08-03. Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.
All federal data sources used on this page
- FEMA OpenFEMA, Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 - all federally-declared disasters for this county. fema.gov/openfema/disaster-declarations
- FEMA National Risk Index (NRI) - per-county per-hazard risk ratings and expected annual loss. hazards.fema.gov/nri
- NOAA NCEI Storm Events Database - state-level storm/severe-weather event records, 2015-2025. ncdc.noaa.gov/stormevents
Data sourced from official public datasets. See our methodology for details. Retrieved and formatted by PlainHazard
Verify with FEMA → · Verify with FEMA NRI → · Verify with NOAA →
Every figure on PlainHazard is rendered directly from FEMA federal disaster data, no number is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or national statistics report, the data & editorial changelog, or report a data error.