FEMA Records
20
Above median
Virginia · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Richmond (city), VA
20 FEMA disaster declarations (1972-2026), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Relatively Low. Most common hazard: Hurricane.
- 20
- FEMA declarations
- 13
- Major disasters
- 78
- NRI risk · Relatively Low
- Hurricane
- Top hazard
The verdict
Richmond (city) has a nationally busy FEMA history: 20 declarations, more than 46% of counties in this registry. But the state comparison tempers that reading: the total is 2% below the Virginia county mean. FEMA's separate National Risk Index places the county in the riskiest 22%; that score models loss and vulnerability rather than counting declarations.
- Riskiest 22%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Relatively Low
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 20
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 547
- 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 51760 · Richmond (city) 20 declarations · rank 1605/3,266
DECL-HEAVY · MAJOR-MID · RANK-LOWER · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-LOW · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-BELOW
- DECL-HEAVY 20
- MAJOR-MID 65%
- RANK-LOWER #1,605
- PHOTO-FINISH Monona
- NRI-LOW 78
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Hurricane
- VS-ST-BELOW -2%
Nearest declaration peer: Monona, IA (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · Virginia state profile
Richmond (city) in the declaration-count neighbourhood
FEMA declaration records among Richmond (city) and nearest peers by total count
- Los Angeles · largest
Los Angeles · largest
88 declarations
- Cleveland · near 20
Cleveland · near
20 declarations
- Monona · near 20
Monona · near
20 declarations
- Richmond (city) · this county 20
Richmond (city) · this county
20 declarations
- Tallapoosa · near 20
Tallapoosa · near
20 declarations
- Ujelang · smallest 1
Ujelang · smallest
1 declarations
What this shows Richmond (city) carries 20 FEMA declaration records, ranked 1605 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
How Richmond (city)'s FEMA declaration count compares nationally
Richmond (city) vs. all counties in this dataset
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time · Richmond (city)
20 46th percentile higher than 46% 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
Richmond (city)'s FEMA Risk Index score
Which hazard drives modeled loss here?
FEMA's modeled annual dollar loss for Richmond (city) is led by Riverine Flooding (about $21.9M Expected Annual Loss, Historical Loss Ratio Relatively Moderate), while Earthquake 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 Richmond (city)'s hazard record show?
Reading the federal records together
FEMA's NFIP table contains a substantial paid-claim history for this county: 547 claims and $11.8M 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 $21.7K. NFIP totals exclude uninsured flood losses and do not measure how many properties currently carry a policy.
Start with the state benchmark: a Virginia county averages 20.4 federal declaration records, while Richmond (city) has 20. The gap is 2% 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 sits among the highest-risk counties nationally on FEMA's National Risk Index, a composite score of 78.4/100 (Relatively Low). Expected Annual Loss is rated Relatively Low (roughly $39.2M in annualized losses). Social vulnerability reads Relatively Low and community resilience Relatively Moderate, both critical modifiers of realized harm here. Among the 18 modeled hazards, Earthquake carries the county's highest rating, a mid-range Relatively Moderate. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at roughly once every 453 years here.
60 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
Richmond (city), VA · 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
14/30
20 OpenFEMA declarations, full ingest window (1.0x national county average)
County Disaster Density Moderate
12/25
20 declarations (1.0x state county average of 20)
Major Disaster Share High
16/25
13 of 20 declarations are major disasters (65%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
18/20
7 different disaster types declared in Richmond (city)
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Richmond (city)
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
65%
Major-heavy
NRI risk score
78
Relatively Low
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Richmond (city)?
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 |
|---|---|---|
| Earthquake | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 453 years |
| Heat Wave | Relatively Moderate | 5.4 modeled event-days per year |
| Riverine Flooding | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 1 years |
| Hurricane | Relatively Low | roughly once every 10 years |
| Tornado | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 29 years |
| Ice Storm | Relatively Low | an average of 1.3 times per year |
| Hail | Relatively Low | an average of 2.4 times per year |
| Lightning | Relatively Moderate | an average of 43 times per year |
| Cold Wave | Relatively Low | roughly once every 2 years |
| Winter Weather | Relatively Low | an average of 5.3 times per year |
| Coastal Flooding | Very Low | an average of 3.7 times per year |
| Strong Wind | Relatively Low | an average of 2.2 times per year |
| Landslide | Very Low | roughly once every 30 years |
| Wildfire | Very Low | roughly once every 84,195 years |
| Drought | No Rating | 5.4 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
Hurricane 8
Severe Storm 3
Snowstorm 3
Biological 2
Flood 2
Winter Storm 1
Freezing 1
What Hurricane declarations mean here
Hurricane is the most frequent declaration type on Richmond (city)'s federal record, 40% of its declarations. Atlantic tropical systems run on a defined season, 1 June to 30 November, with most activity concentrated between August and October; Pacific and territorial basins run on their own calendars. A single named storm routinely produces one declaration number covering a long corridor of counties at once, well inland as well as on the coast, which is why an affected county's count can jump by several in one year without several separate events having occurred.
One practical distinction matters when reading these records: a tropical declaration usually bundles wind, storm surge and inland rainfall flooding under a single incident, but the insurance behind them is split. Wind damage falls to property insurers, while flood and surge damage is covered only under a separate National Flood Insurance Program policy. That is why a county can show heavy declaration activity and a comparatively small NFIP claims record, or the reverse.
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 - 13 65.0%
of all 20 declarations
Emergency - 7 35.0%
of all 20 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 1 | |
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2019 | 1 | |
| 2018 | 1 | |
| 2013 | 1 | |
| 2011 | 2 | |
| 2006 | 1 | |
| 2005 | 1 | |
| 2004 | 1 | |
| 2003 | 1 | |
| 2000 | 1 | |
| 1999 | 1 | |
| 1996 | 1 | |
| 1994 | 1 | |
| 1993 | 1 | |
Show 3 earlier declaration years
| 1986 | 1 | |
| 1977 | 1 | |
| 1972 | 1 | |
Disaster Declarations
How the 20 FEMA declarations break into federal action codes (DR / EM / FM). Same DISTINCT grain as the table below.
Download these 20 declarations as CSV . FEMA source data is public domain; our derived presentation is CC0.
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3631 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | EM | Winter Storm | 2026-01-23 |
| 4512 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-04-02 |
| 3448 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 4401 | HURRICANE FLORENCE | DR | Hurricane | 2018-10-15 |
| 3403 | HURRICANE FLORENCE | EM | Hurricane | 2018-09-11 |
| 3359 | HURRICANE SANDY | EM | Hurricane | 2012-10-29 |
| 4024 | HURRICANE IRENE | DR | Hurricane | 2011-09-03 |
| 3329 | HURRICANE IRENE | EM | Hurricane | 2011-08-26 |
| 1661 | TROPICAL DEPRESSION ERNESTO, SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2006-09-22 |
| 3240 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-12 |
| 1544 | SEVERE STORMS, FLOODING AND TORNADOES ASSOCIATED W TD GASTON | DR | Severe Storm | 2004-09-03 |
| 1491 | HURRICANE ISABEL | DR | Hurricane | 2003-09-18 |
| 1318 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | DR | Severe Storm | 2000-02-28 |
| 1293 | HURRICANE FLOYD MAJOR DISASTER DECLARATIONS | DR | Hurricane | 1999-09-18 |
| 1086 | BLIZZARD OF 96 (SEVERE SNOW STORM) | DR | Snowstorm | 1996-01-13 |
| 1014 | SEVERE ICE STORMS, FLOODING | DR | Snowstorm | 1994-03-10 |
| 3112 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | EM | Snowstorm | 1993-03-25 |
| 755 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1985-11-09 |
| 525 | ICE CONDITIONS | DR | Freezing | 1977-01-26 |
| 339 | TROPICAL STORM AGNES | DR | Flood | 1972-06-23 |
Storm Events in Virginia
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Richmond (city).
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thunderstorm Wind | 8,940 | 13 | 31 | $123.1M |
| Flood | 2,300 | 4 | 0 | $85.1M |
| Winter Weather | 2,049 | 6 | 32 | $902.0K |
| Flash Flood | 1,942 | 13 | 4 | $244.2M |
| Heavy Rain | 1,566 | 0 | 0 | $2.5M |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
NFIP Flood Insurance Claims
Total Claims
547
Total Paid
$11.8M
Avg Per Claim
$21.7K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Relatively Low
Score: 78.4/100
Expected Annual Loss
Relatively Low
$39.2M/year
Social Vulnerability
Relatively Low
Community Resilience
Relatively Moderate
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Earthquake Relatively Moderate
Heat Wave Relatively Moderate
Riverine Flooding Relatively Moderate
Hurricane Relatively Low
Tornado Relatively Moderate
Ice Storm Relatively Low
Hail Relatively Low
Lightning Relatively Moderate
Cold Wave Relatively Low
Winter Weather Relatively Low
Coastal Flooding Very Low
Strong Wind Relatively Low
Landslide Very Low
Wildfire 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: Earthquake
Earthquake is the model's clearest example of a hazard with no season and no warning. Its expected loss is driven less by how often shaking occurs than by how much of the building stock predates modern seismic codes, so exposure can be high in places where nothing has happened for a long time.
Worth noting for Richmond (city): the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Earthquake carries the highest modeled rating (Relatively Moderate), while the county's declaration history is led by Hurricane. 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
Richmond (city)'s closest FEMA peer: Arkansas County, AR
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Richmond (city). Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Richmond (city) shows 20 FEMA declarations, led by Hurricane.
Similar Major-disaster share
Richmond (city): 13 of 20 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Richmond (city): NRI composite 78.4 (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 Richmond (city) - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for Richmond (city): 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: 78.4 (Relatively Low).
Similar declaration volume
Nearest out-of-state counties by FEMA declaration count. This county: 20. NRI peers are excluded so the two link sets stay distinct.
Further reading for this county
Understanding disaster data
Richmond (city)'s NFIP claims file (547 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 Richmond (city)?
The most common disaster type in Richmond (city) is Hurricane, with 8 declarations. Other disaster types include Severe Storm (3), Snowstorm (3), Biological (2).
How does Richmond (city)'s FEMA declaration record compare with the Virginia average?
The typical Virginia county has 20.4 FEMA declaration records; Richmond (city) has 20, or 2% fewer. Against the national county mean of 20.7, this county's total is 3% lower. The comparison is historical and says nothing about the probability of a future event.
How many major FEMA disaster declarations has Richmond (city) received?
Richmond (city) has received 13 major disaster declarations, representing 65% of all 20 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has Richmond (city) filed?
Richmond (city) has 547 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $11.8M in payments, with an average of $21.7K per claim.
Does FEMA's top risk-rated hazard match the highest Expected Annual Loss in Richmond (city)?
No. In Richmond (city), Earthquake has the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively Moderate), while Riverine Flooding leads Expected Annual Loss at about $21.9M. FEMA's risk score and dollar-loss model use different inputs, so the leaders often differ.
What was the worst year for disasters in Richmond (city)?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Richmond (city) was 2011, with 2 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1972 to 2026.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Richmond (city)?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Richmond (city), Virginia has an overall risk score of 78.4 out of 100 (Relatively Low). On social vulnerability the county rates Relatively Low; on community resilience, Relatively Moderate. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Relatively Low, representing $39.2M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Richmond (city)?
FEMA's NRI data points to Richmond (city) is Earthquake (risk rating: Relatively Moderate). Other significant hazards include Heat Wave (Relatively Moderate) and Riverine Flooding (Relatively Moderate). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts earthquake here at roughly once every 453 years. 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 Richmond (city) · vintage 2026-08-25 · Methodology · Virginia profile · Verify with FEMA OpenFEMA · Verify with NOAA Storm Events