FEMA Records
22
Above median
Indiana · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Lake County, IN
22 FEMA disaster declarations (1977-2026), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Relatively High. Most common hazard: Severe Storm.
- 22
- FEMA declarations
- 15
- Major disasters
- 96
- NRI risk · Relatively High
- Severe Storm
- Top hazard
The verdict
Two federal records point in the busier direction for Lake County. Its 22 FEMA declarations are 28% above the Indiana county mean and exceed the count for 57% of the 3,266 counties in this registry. Separately, FEMA's National Risk Index places it in the riskiest 4%, based on modeled expected annual loss, social vulnerability, and community resilience.
- Riskiest 4%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Relatively High
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 22
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 2,996
- 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 18089 · Lake County 22 declarations · rank 1302/3,266
DECL-HEAVY · MAJOR-MID · RANK-LOWER · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-HIGH · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-ABOVE
- DECL-HEAVY 22
- MAJOR-MID 68%
- RANK-LOWER #1,302
- PHOTO-FINISH Hardy
- NRI-HIGH 96
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Severe Storm
- VS-ST-ABOVE +28%
Nearest declaration peer: Hardy, WV (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · Indiana state profile
Lake County in the declaration-count neighbourhood
FEMA declaration records among Lake County and nearest peers by total count
- Los Angeles · largest
Los Angeles · largest
88 declarations
- Hardy · near 22
Hardy · near
22 declarations
- Lake · this county 22
Lake · this county
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 Lake County carries 22 FEMA declaration records, ranked 1302 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
How Lake County's FEMA declaration count compares nationally
Lake County vs. all counties in this dataset
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time · Lake County
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 · 2026-08-25
Lake County's FEMA Risk Index score
Which hazard drives modeled loss here?
FEMA's modeled annual dollar loss for Lake County is led by Riverine Flooding (about $89.8M Expected Annual Loss, Historical Loss Ratio Relatively Moderate), while Cold Wave carries the highest National Risk Index rating (Very High). 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 Lake County's hazard record show?
Reading the federal records together
FEMA's NFIP table contains a substantial paid-claim history for this county: 2,996 claims and $49.4M in payments. PlainHazard labels 500 or more claims a heavy registry record; that is a reporting bucket, not an official FEMA risk grade. The average paid claim was $16.5K. NFIP totals exclude uninsured flood losses and do not measure how many properties currently carry a policy.
The declaration register points in the busier direction. Lake County's 22 federal records stand 28% above the Indiana county mean of 17.1. That comparison describes how often federal action was recorded, including any Major Disaster, Emergency, and Fire Management entries shown on this page; it does not convert the count into future probability.
FEMA National Risk Index
This county sits among the highest-risk counties nationally on FEMA's National Risk Index, a composite score of 95.9/100 (Relatively High). Expected Annual Loss is rated Relatively High (roughly $191.0M in annualized losses). Social vulnerability reads Relatively Moderate and community resilience Relatively High, both critical modifiers of realized harm here. Of the 18 hazards FEMA models, Cold Wave stands out as the sharpest exposure here, rated Very High. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at an average of 3.6 times per year here, based on 69 historical events on record.
64 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
Lake County, IN · 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 High
16/25
22 declarations (1.3x state county average of 17)
Major Disaster Share High
17/25
15 of 22 declarations are major disasters (68%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
15/20
6 different disaster types declared in Lake County
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Lake 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
68%
Major-heavy
NRI risk score
96
Relatively High
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Lake 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Cold Wave | Very High | an average of 3.6 times per year |
| Tornado | Very High | roughly once every 2 years |
| Riverine Flooding | Relatively High | an average of 2.4 times per year |
| Winter Weather | Relatively High | an average of 14 times per year |
| Strong Wind | Relatively High | an average of 5.5 times per year |
| Heat Wave | Relatively Moderate | 3.2 modeled event-days per year |
| Lightning | Relatively High | an average of 43 times per year |
| Earthquake | Relatively Low | roughly once every 737 years |
| Ice Storm | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 1 years |
| Hail | Relatively Low | an average of 3.7 times per year |
| Wildfire | Relatively Low | roughly once every 2,086 years |
| Landslide | Very Low | roughly once every 9 years |
| Coastal Flooding | Very Low | roughly once every 81 years |
| Hurricane | Very Low | roughly once every 157 years |
| Drought | No Rating | 0 modeled event-days 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
Snowstorm 4
Flood 3
Biological 2
Winter Storm 1
Hurricane 1
What Severe Storm declarations mean here
Severe Storm is the most frequent declaration type on Lake County's record, 50% 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 68.2%
of all 22 declarations
Emergency - 7 31.8%
of all 22 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 1 | |
| 2023 | 1 | |
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2018 | 1 | |
| 2014 | 1 | |
| 2009 | 1 | |
| 2008 | 3 | |
| 2007 | 2 | |
| 2005 | 2 | |
| 2004 | 1 | |
| 2003 | 1 | |
| 2001 | 1 | |
| 1999 | 1 | |
| 1998 | 1 | |
| 1991 | 2 | |
Show 1 earlier declaration years
| 1977 | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3641 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | EM | Winter Storm | 2026-01-24 |
| 4704 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, AND TORNADOES | DR | Severe Storm | 2023-04-15 |
| 4515 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-04-03 |
| 3456 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 4363 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Flood | 2018-05-04 |
| 4173 | SEVERE WINTER STORM AND SNOWSTORM | DR | Severe Storm | 2014-04-22 |
| 1832 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2009-04-22 |
| 1795 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2008-09-23 |
| 1740 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2008-01-30 |
| 1732 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2007-11-30 |
| 3274 | SNOW | EM | Snowstorm | 2007-03-12 |
| 1662 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2006-10-06 |
| 3238 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-10 |
| 1573 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2005-01-21 |
| 1520 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2004-06-03 |
| 1476 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2003-07-11 |
| 3162 | SNOW | EM | Snowstorm | 2001-01-24 |
| 3135 | IN-WINTER STORM 12/23/98 | EM | Snowstorm | 1999-01-15 |
| 1217 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | DR | Severe Storm | 1998-05-08 |
| 891 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1991-01-05 |
Show 2 earlier declaration records
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 885 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1990-12-06 |
| 3028 | SNOWSTORMS | EM | Snowstorm | 1977-02-02 |
Storm Events in Indiana
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Lake County.
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thunderstorm Wind | 4,886 | 16 | 73 | $57.6M |
| Hail | 1,643 | 0 | 0 | $1.7M |
| Winter Weather | 1,166 | 32 | 80 | $2.5M |
| Flood | 850 | 13 | 3 | $16.0M |
| Flash Flood | 648 | 14 | 5 | $97.9M |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
NFIP Flood Insurance Claims
Total Claims
2,996
Total Paid
$49.4M
Avg Per Claim
$16.5K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Relatively High
Score: 95.9/100
Expected Annual Loss
Relatively High
$191.0M/year
Social Vulnerability
Relatively Moderate
Community Resilience
Relatively High
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Cold Wave Very High
Tornado Very High
Riverine Flooding Relatively High
Winter Weather Relatively High
Strong Wind Relatively High
Heat Wave Relatively Moderate
Lightning Relatively High
Earthquake Relatively Low
Ice Storm Relatively Moderate
Hail Relatively Low
Wildfire Relatively Low
Landslide Very Low
Coastal Flooding Very Low
Hurricane Very Low
Drought 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: Cold Wave
Cold Wave measures exposure to extreme cold rather than to snow. Its harm is concentrated in health effects, burst infrastructure and energy demand spikes, and it falls hardest where the building stock and the grid were not built with sustained cold in mind.
Worth noting for Lake County: the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Cold Wave carries the highest modeled rating (Very High), 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
Lake County's closest FEMA peer: Howard County, MD
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Lake County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Lake County shows 22 FEMA declarations, led by Severe Storm.
Similar Major-disaster share
Lake County: 15 of 22 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Lake County: NRI composite 95.9 (Relatively High).
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 Lake County - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for Lake 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: 95.9 (Relatively High).
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
Understanding disaster data
Lake County's NFIP claims file (2,996 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 Lake County?
The most common disaster type in Lake County is Severe Storm, with 11 declarations. Other disaster types include Snowstorm (4), Flood (3), Biological (2).
How does Lake County's FEMA declaration record compare with the Indiana average?
FEMA lists 22 declaration records for Lake County. That is 28% above the Indiana county mean of 17.1. Its count is also 6% above the national county mean of 20.7. A larger declaration history records more federal actions; it is not a forecast of the county's next hazard.
How many major FEMA disaster declarations has Lake County received?
Lake County has received 15 major disaster declarations, representing 68% of all 22 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has Lake County filed?
Lake County has 2,996 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $49.4M in payments, with an average of $16.5K per claim.
Does FEMA's top risk-rated hazard match the highest Expected Annual Loss in Lake County?
No. In Lake County, Cold Wave has the highest National Risk Index rating (Very High), while Riverine Flooding leads Expected Annual Loss at about $89.8M. FEMA's risk score and dollar-loss model use different inputs, so the leaders often differ.
What was the worst year for disasters in Lake County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Lake County was 2008, with 3 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1977 to 2026.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Lake County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Lake County, Indiana has an overall risk score of 95.9 out of 100 (Relatively High). Social vulnerability here rates Relatively Moderate, while community resilience comes in at Relatively High. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Relatively High, representing $191.0M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Lake County?
FEMA's NRI data points to Lake County as of the latest release is Cold Wave (risk rating: Very High). Other significant hazards include Tornado (Very High) and Riverine Flooding (Relatively High). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts cold wave here at an average of 3.6 times per year, drawn from 69 historical events on record. FEMA derives these ratings from historical event frequency, the assets exposed, and the community's vulnerability profile.
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 Lake County · vintage 2026-08-25 · Methodology · Indiana profile · Verify with FEMA OpenFEMA · Verify with NOAA Storm Events