FEMA Records
25
High volume
Kansas · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Stafford County, KS
25 FEMA disaster declarations (1965-2025), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Very Low. Most common hazard: Severe Storm.
- 25
- FEMA declarations
- 22
- Major disasters
- 23
- NRI risk · Very Low
- Severe Storm
- Top hazard
The verdict
Two federal records point in the busier direction for Stafford County. Its 25 FEMA declarations are 39% above the Kansas county mean and exceed the count for 71% of the 3,266 counties in this registry. Separately, FEMA's National Risk Index places it safer than 23%, based on modeled expected annual loss, social vulnerability, and community resilience.
- Safer than 23%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Very Low
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 25
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 15
- severe storm declarations, the most common hazard here
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.
How does Stafford County compare?
Stafford County vs. all counties in this dataset
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time
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 · 2026-08-03
Stafford County's FEMA Risk Index score
FEMA National Risk Index composite score vs. the Kansas county average
What does Stafford County's hazard record show?
Declaration frequency
The FEMA register is busy by both local and national comparisons. It contains 25 entries for Stafford County, including 22 Major Disaster records, 39% above the Kansas county mean. Across the 60-year span, that works out to 0.4 declarations a year. Severe Storm leads the file with 15 entries. Declaration type records the federal action taken, not every assistance program approved.
FEMA National Risk Index
This county's FEMA National Risk Index composite lands at 23.1/100 (Very Low), a modest reading against the rest of the country. Expected Annual Loss is rated Very Low (roughly $8.1M in annualized losses), tempered or compounded by a Relatively Low social-vulnerability score and Relatively Moderate community-resilience score. Of the 18 hazards FEMA models, Drought stands out as the sharpest exposure here, rated Relatively High. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at 71 modeled event-days per year here, based on 1,953 historical events on record.
Reading the federal records together
No paid-claim row for this county appears in the NFIP county table used by PlainHazard. That absence is not evidence that flooding never occurred: the register observes claims under federal flood-insurance policies, not uninsured losses, emergency reports, or every flood outside the program. The FEMA declaration history below is therefore the available federal-action record on this page.
The declaration register points in the busier direction. Stafford County's 25 federal records stand 39% above the Kansas county mean of 18.0. 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.
75 /100
Historical Activity Index
Very High historical activity
Stafford County, KS · 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 High
17/25
25 declarations (1.4x state county average of 18)
Major Disaster Share Very High
22/25
22 of 25 declarations are major disasters (88%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
18/20
7 different disaster types declared in Stafford County
Historical Declaration Activity
Activity Band
High
vs. Kansas Avg
+39%
State avg: 18.0
vs. National Avg
+21%
National avg: 20.7
Avg Per Year
0.4
Over 60 years
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Stafford 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
88%
Mostly major
NRI risk score
23
Very Low
Source: FEMA National Risk Index FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Stafford 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 High | 71 modeled event-days per year |
| Hail | Relatively Moderate | an average of 11 times per year |
| Wildfire | Relatively Low | roughly once every 447 years |
| Cold Wave | Relatively Low | an average of 2.8 times per year |
| Ice Storm | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 1 years |
| Tornado | Relatively Low | roughly once every 1 years |
| Strong Wind | Relatively Low | an average of 6.1 times per year |
| Winter Weather | Relatively Low | an average of 9.8 times per year |
| Heat Wave | Very Low | 6.4 modeled event-days per year |
| Earthquake | Very Low | roughly once every 1,508 years |
| Riverine Flooding | Very Low | roughly once every 2 years |
| Lightning | Very Low | an average of 46 times per year |
| Landslide | Very Low | roughly once every 11 years |
Source: FEMA National Risk Index FEMA National Risk Index Modeled annualized frequency; drought and heat wave use event-days/year, December 2025 release
Disaster Types
Severe Storm 15
Flood 3
Snowstorm 2
Biological 2
Winter Storm 1
Severe Ice Storm 1
Hurricane 1
What Severe Storm declarations mean here
Severe Storm is the most frequent declaration type on Stafford County's record, 60% 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 - 22 88.0%
of all 25 declarations
Emergency - 3 12.0%
of all 25 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 2 | |
| 2024 | 3 | |
| 2022 | 2 | |
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2019 | 1 | |
| 2017 | 1 | |
| 2013 | 1 | |
| 2012 | 1 | |
| 2011 | 1 | |
| 2009 | 1 | |
| 2008 | 3 | |
| 2007 | 2 | |
| 2005 | 1 | |
| 1993 | 1 | |
| 1973 | 2 | |
Show 1 earlier declaration years
| 1965 | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4883 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2025-07-22 |
| 4869 | SEVERE WINTER STORM, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, FLOODING, AND WILDFIRES | DR | Severe Storm | 2025-05-21 |
| 4811 | SEVERE STORM, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2024-08-20 |
| 4774 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | DR | Winter Storm | 2024-04-28 |
| 4747 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2023-10-26 |
| 4654 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS AND STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS | DR | Snowstorm | 2022-05-25 |
| 4640 | SEVERE STORMS AND STRAIGHT LINE WINDS | DR | Severe Storm | 2022-02-17 |
| 4504 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-03-29 |
| 3481 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 4449 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, FLOODING,LANDSLIDES,AND MUDSLIDES | DR | Severe Storm | 2019-06-20 |
| 4304 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | DR | Severe Ice Storm | 2017-02-24 |
| 4112 | SNOWSTORM | DR | Snowstorm | 2013-04-26 |
| 4063 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2012-05-24 |
| 4010 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2011-07-29 |
| 1848 | SEVERE WINTER STORM AND RECORD AND NEAR RECORD SNOW | DR | Severe Storm | 2009-06-24 |
| 1776 | SEVERE STORMS, FLOODING AND TORNADOES | DR | Severe Storm | 2008-07-09 |
| 1741 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | DR | Severe Storm | 2008-02-01 |
| 3282 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | EM | Severe Storm | 2007-12-12 |
| 1699 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2007-05-06 |
| 1675 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | DR | Severe Storm | 2007-01-07 |
Show 5 earlier declaration records
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3236 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-10 |
| 1000 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1993-07-22 |
| 403 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES & FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 1973-09-28 |
| 378 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1973-05-02 |
| 201 | FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1965-06-23 |
Storm Events in Kansas
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Stafford County.
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hail | 8,265 | 0 | 9 | $24.2M |
| Thunderstorm Wind | 7,987 | 3 | 34 | $30.6M |
| High Wind | 1,553 | 1 | 7 | $10.2M |
| Drought | 1,272 | 0 | 0 | $0 |
| Flash Flood | 1,037 | 6 | 9 | $35.9M |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Very Low
Score: 23.1/100
Expected Annual Loss
Very Low
$8.1M/year
Social Vulnerability
Relatively Low
Community Resilience
Relatively Moderate
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Drought Relatively High
Hail Relatively Moderate
Wildfire Relatively Low
Cold Wave Relatively Low
Ice Storm Relatively Moderate
Tornado Relatively Low
Strong Wind Relatively Low
Winter Weather Relatively Low
Heat Wave Very Low
Earthquake Very Low
Riverine Flooding Very Low
Lightning Very Low
Landslide Very Low
Hurricane No Rating
Source: FEMA National Risk Index (NRI) 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 Stafford County: the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Drought carries the highest modeled rating (Relatively 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
Stafford County's closest FEMA peer: Calhoun County, IL
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Stafford County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Stafford County shows 25 FEMA declarations, led by Severe Storm.
Similar Major-disaster share
Stafford County: 22 of 25 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Stafford County: NRI composite 23.1 (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 Stafford County - capture-dated entries only.
Further reading for this county
Most disaster-prone counties
With 25 FEMA declarations, Stafford 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).
Related
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the most common disaster type in Stafford County?
The most common disaster type in Stafford County is Severe Storm, with 15 declarations. Other disaster types include Flood (3), Snowstorm (2), Biological (2).
How does Stafford County's FEMA declaration record compare with the Kansas average?
FEMA lists 25 declaration records for Stafford County. That is 39% above the Kansas county mean of 18.0. Its count is also 21% 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 Stafford County received?
Stafford County has received 22 major disaster declarations, representing 88% of all 25 disaster declarations.
What was the worst year for disasters in Stafford County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Stafford County was 2008, with 3 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1965 to 2025.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Stafford County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Stafford County, Kansas has an overall risk score of 23.1 out of 100 (Very Low). On social vulnerability the county rates Relatively Low; on community resilience, Relatively Moderate. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Very Low, representing $8.1M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Stafford County?
The top hazard flagged by FEMA's NRI for Stafford County as of the latest release is Drought (risk rating: Relatively High). Other significant hazards include Hail (Relatively Moderate) and Wildfire (Relatively Low). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts drought here at 71 modeled event-days per year, drawn from 1,953 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.
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.
What this means for Stafford County
Stafford County, KS has 25 federal declaration records, 39% more than the Kansas county mean of 18; its history sits in PlainHazard's high activity band.
- Within this above-state-average declaration file, major disaster leads with 22 of 25 records; the category describes past federal action, not the next likely hazard. Kansas overview
- The state benchmark and national rank point the same way: this count tops the Kansas mean and the totals for 71% of 3,266 U.S. counties. Most-disaster rankings
- With no NFIP county row, the declaration register and modeled NRI remain distinct evidence rather than substitutes for a claims history. Disaster-data guide
An above-average declaration count records past federal responses; it does not predict the next event. Current warnings come from the National Weather Service and local emergency officials.
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 Editorial
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.