FEMA Records
21
Above median
Arizona · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Navajo County, AZ
21 FEMA disaster declarations (1970-2021), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Relatively Moderate. Most common hazard: Flood.
- 21
- FEMA declarations
- 12
- Major disasters
- 88
- NRI risk · Relatively Moderate
- Flood
- Top hazard
The verdict
Two federal records point in the busier direction for Navajo County. Its 21 FEMA declarations are 26% above the Arizona county mean and exceed the count for 52% of the 3,266 counties in this registry. Separately, FEMA's National Risk Index places it in the riskiest 12%, based on modeled expected annual loss, social vulnerability, and community resilience.
- Riskiest 12%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Relatively Moderate
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 21
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 106
- 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 04017 · Navajo County 21 declarations · rank 1524/3,266
DECL-HEAVY · MAJOR-MID · RANK-LOWER · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-MID · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-ABOVE
- DECL-HEAVY 21
- MAJOR-MID 57%
- RANK-LOWER #1,524
- PHOTO-FINISH Montgomery
- NRI-MID 88
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Flood
- VS-ST-ABOVE +26%
Nearest declaration peer: Montgomery, IN (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · Arizona state profile
Navajo County in the declaration-count neighbourhood
FEMA declaration records among Navajo County and nearest peers by total count
- Los Angeles · largest
Los Angeles · largest
88 declarations
- Atascosa · near 21
Atascosa · near
21 declarations
- Mason · near 21
Mason · near
21 declarations
- Montgomery · near 21
Montgomery · near
21 declarations
- Navajo · this county 21
Navajo · this county
21 declarations
- Ujelang · smallest 1
Ujelang · smallest
1 declarations
What this shows Navajo County carries 21 FEMA declaration records, ranked 1524 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
How Navajo County's FEMA declaration count compares nationally
Navajo County vs. all counties in this dataset
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time · Navajo County
21 Top 48% higher than 52% 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
Navajo County's FEMA Risk Index score
Which hazard drives modeled loss here?
FEMA's modeled annual dollar loss for Navajo County is led by Riverine Flooding (about $20.5M Expected Annual Loss, Historical Loss Ratio Relatively Low), while Lightning 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 Navajo County's hazard record show?
Reading the federal records together
The NFIP claims register shows a middle-volume loss record here: 106 paid claims, totaling $971.2K. PlainHazard uses 50-499 claims for this descriptive band; FEMA does not publish it as a safety or coverage category. The $9.2K average describes payments on recorded claims only, leaving uninsured damage and properties without a claim outside the measure.
The declaration register points in the busier direction. Navajo County's 21 federal records stand 26% above the Arizona county mean of 16.7. 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 88.1/100 (Relatively Moderate). Expected Annual Loss is rated Relatively Low (roughly $40.0M in annualized losses). Social vulnerability reads Very High and community resilience Very Low, both critical modifiers of realized harm here. Of the 18 hazards FEMA models, Lightning stands out as the sharpest exposure here, rated Very High. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at an average of 48 times per year here, based on 439,075 historical events on record.
60 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
Navajo County, AZ · 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
15/30
21 OpenFEMA declarations, full ingest window (1.0x national county average)
County Disaster Density High
16/25
21 declarations (1.3x state county average of 17)
Major Disaster Share High
14/25
12 of 21 declarations are major disasters (57%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
15/20
6 different disaster types declared in Navajo County
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Navajo 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
57%
Major-heavy
NRI risk score
88
Relatively Moderate
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Navajo 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Lightning | Very High | an average of 48 times per year |
| Wildfire | Relatively High | roughly once every 225 years |
| Winter Weather | Very High | an average of 5.8 times per year |
| Landslide | Relatively Moderate | an average of 2.5 times per year |
| Riverine Flooding | Relatively Moderate | an average of 4.1 times per year |
| Earthquake | Relatively Low | roughly once every 572 years |
| Cold Wave | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 58 years |
| Ice Storm | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 67 years |
| Heat Wave | Relatively Low | 0.8 modeled event-days per year |
| Volcanic Activity | Very Low | roughly once every 5,000 years |
| Drought | Relatively Low | 103 modeled event-days per year |
| Avalanche | Very Low | roughly once every 100 years |
| Strong Wind | Relatively Low | roughly once every 18 years |
| Hail | Relatively Low | roughly once every 9 years |
| Tornado | Very Low | roughly once every 3 years |
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Modeled annualized frequency; drought and heat wave use event-days/year, December 2025 release
Disaster Types
Flood 7
Fire 6
Severe Storm 4
Biological 2
Hurricane 1
Drought 1
What Flood declarations mean here
Flood is the most frequent declaration type on Navajo County's record, 33% of its declarations. Federal flood declarations cover two mechanisms that behave very differently: riverine flooding, which builds over days as a watershed drains and is usually forecast well in advance, and flash flooding, which can arrive in under an hour from rainfall that fell somewhere upstream.
Flood is also the one hazard class where a second federal dataset exists for the same events. The National Flood Insurance Program records what was actually paid on insured losses, so it measures a narrower thing than the declaration count: uninsured damage, and flooding outside mapped special flood hazard areas, never enters it. Reading the two together is more informative than either alone.
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 - 12 57.1%
of all 21 declarations
Fire Management - 5 23.8%
of all 21 declarations
Emergency - 4 19.0%
of all 21 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2021 | 1 | |
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2010 | 2 | |
| 2006 | 2 | |
| 2005 | 2 | |
| 2003 | 1 | |
| 2002 | 3 | |
| 1999 | 1 | |
| 1993 | 1 | |
| 1984 | 1 | |
| 1980 | 1 | |
| 1979 | 1 | |
| 1978 | 1 | |
| 1977 | 1 | |
| 1970 | 1 | |
Disaster Declarations
How the 21 FEMA declarations break into federal action codes (DR / EM / FM). Same DISTINCT grain as the table below.
Download these 21 declarations as CSV . FEMA source data is public domain; our derived presentation is CC0.
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4620 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Flood | 2021-09-13 |
| 4524 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-04-04 |
| 3442 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 1888 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2010-03-18 |
| 3307 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | EM | Severe Storm | 2010-01-24 |
| 1660 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2006-09-07 |
| 2642 | POTATO FIRE | FM | Fire | 2006-06-13 |
| 3241 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-12 |
| 1581 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2005-02-17 |
| 2478 | KINISHBA FIRE | FM | Fire | 2003-07-14 |
| 1422 | WILDFIRES | DR | Fire | 2002-06-25 |
| 2430 | AZ - CHEDISKI FARMS FIRE - 06/21/2002 | FM | Fire | 2002-06-21 |
| 2429 | RODEO FIRE | FM | Fire | 2002-06-19 |
| 2263 | AZ - RAINBOW FIRE - 06/11/1999 | FM | Fire | 1999-06-12 |
| 977 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1993-01-19 |
| 691 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1983-10-05 |
| 614 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1980-02-19 |
| 570 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1978-12-21 |
| 551 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1978-03-04 |
| 3038 | DROUGHT | EM | Drought | 1977-04-15 |
Show 1 earlier declaration records
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 294 | HEAVY RAINS & FLASH | DR | Flood | 1970-09-22 |
Storm Events in Arizona
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Navajo County.
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Flash Flood | 2,094 | 45 | 18 | $149.9M |
| Excessive Heat | 1,812 | 1,497 | 120 | $0 |
| Thunderstorm Wind | 1,680 | 3 | 19 | $75.9M |
| Heat | 727 | 1,206 | 39 | $0 |
| High Wind | 446 | 0 | 0 | $734.0K |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
NFIP Flood Insurance Claims
Total Claims
106
Total Paid
$971.2K
Avg Per Claim
$9.2K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Relatively Moderate
Score: 88.1/100
Expected Annual Loss
Relatively Low
$40.0M/year
Social Vulnerability
Very High
Community Resilience
Very Low
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Lightning Very High
Wildfire Relatively High
Winter Weather Very High
Landslide Relatively Moderate
Riverine Flooding Relatively Moderate
Earthquake Relatively Low
Cold Wave Relatively Moderate
Ice Storm Relatively Moderate
Heat Wave Relatively Low
Volcanic Activity Very Low
Drought Relatively Low
Avalanche Very Low
Strong Wind Relatively Low
Hail Relatively Low
Tornado 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: Lightning
Lightning is modeled as a high-frequency, low-per-event hazard: strike counts are large, but each strike affects a very small area. Its aggregate cost accumulates through structure fires, electrical and electronic damage, and it is one of the few hazards whose risk is essentially continuous through the season rather than episodic.
Worth noting for Navajo County: the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Lightning carries the highest modeled rating (Very High), while the county's declaration history is led by Flood. 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
Navajo County's closest FEMA peer: Clay County, TX
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Navajo County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Navajo County shows 21 FEMA declarations, led by Flood.
Similar Major-disaster share
Navajo County: 12 of 21 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Navajo County: NRI composite 88.1 (Relatively Moderate).
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 Navajo County - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for Navajo 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: 88.1 (Relatively Moderate).
Similar declaration volume
Nearest out-of-state counties by FEMA declaration count. This county: 21. NRI peers are excluded so the two link sets stay distinct.
Further reading for this county
Understanding disaster data
Navajo County's NFIP claims file (106 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 Navajo County?
The most common disaster type in Navajo County is Flood, with 7 declarations. Other disaster types include Fire (6), Severe Storm (4), Biological (2).
How does Navajo County's FEMA declaration record compare with the Arizona average?
FEMA lists 21 declaration records for Navajo County. That is 26% above the Arizona county mean of 16.7. Its count is also 1% 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 Navajo County received?
Navajo County has received 12 major disaster declarations, representing 57% of all 21 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has Navajo County filed?
Navajo County has 106 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $971.2K in payments, with an average of $9.2K per claim.
Does FEMA's top risk-rated hazard match the highest Expected Annual Loss in Navajo County?
No. In Navajo County, Lightning has the highest National Risk Index rating (Very High), while Riverine Flooding leads Expected Annual Loss at about $20.5M. FEMA's risk score and dollar-loss model use different inputs, so the leaders often differ.
What was the worst year for disasters in Navajo County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Navajo County was 2002, with 3 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1970 to 2021.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Navajo County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Navajo County, Arizona has an overall risk score of 88.1 out of 100 (Relatively Moderate). On social vulnerability the county rates Very High; on community resilience, Very Low. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Relatively Low, representing $40.0M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Navajo County?
Based on FEMA NRI data, the highest-risk natural hazard in Navajo County as of the latest release is Lightning (risk rating: Very High). Other significant hazards include Wildfire (Relatively High) and Winter Weather (Very High). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts lightning here at an average of 48 times per year, drawn from 439,075 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 Navajo County · vintage 2026-08-25 · Methodology · Arizona profile · Verify with FEMA OpenFEMA · Verify with NOAA Storm Events