FEMA Records
20
Above median
California · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Sutter County, CA
20 FEMA disaster declarations (1965-2024), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Relatively Moderate. Most common hazard: Severe Storm.
- 20
- FEMA declarations
- 15
- Major disasters
- 84
- NRI risk · Relatively Moderate
- Severe Storm
- Top hazard
The verdict
Sutter County 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 30% below the California county mean. FEMA's separate National Risk Index places the county in the riskiest 16%; that score models loss and vulnerability rather than counting declarations.
- Riskiest 16%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Relatively Moderate
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 20
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 199
- 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 06101 · Sutter County 20 declarations · rank 1710/3,266
DECL-HEAVY · MAJOR-MID · RANK-LOWER · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-MID · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-BELOW
- DECL-HEAVY 20
- MAJOR-MID 75%
- RANK-LOWER #1,710
- PHOTO-FINISH Monona
- NRI-MID 84
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Severe Storm
- VS-ST-BELOW -30%
Nearest declaration peer: Monona, IA (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · California state profile
Sutter County in the declaration-count neighbourhood
FEMA declaration records among Sutter County 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
- Sutter · this county 20
Sutter · this county
20 declarations
- Tallapoosa · near 20
Tallapoosa · near
20 declarations
- Ujelang · smallest 1
Ujelang · smallest
1 declarations
What this shows Sutter County carries 20 FEMA declaration records, ranked 1710 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
How Sutter County's FEMA declaration count compares nationally
Sutter County vs. all counties in this dataset
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time · Sutter County
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
Sutter County's FEMA Risk Index score
What does Sutter County's hazard record show?
Reading the federal records together
The NFIP claims register shows a middle-volume loss record here: 199 paid claims, totaling $3.0M. PlainHazard uses 50-499 claims for this descriptive band; FEMA does not publish it as a safety or coverage category. The $15.3K average describes payments on recorded claims only, leaving uninsured damage and properties without a claim outside the measure.
Start with the state benchmark: a California county averages 28.5 federal declaration records, while Sutter County has 20. The gap is 30% 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 83.7/100 (Relatively Moderate). Expected Annual Loss is rated Relatively Low (roughly $44.8M in annualized losses). Social vulnerability reads Relatively Moderate and community resilience Relatively Moderate, both critical modifiers of realized harm here. Of the 18 hazards FEMA models, Drought stands out as the sharpest exposure here, rated Very High. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at 65 modeled event-days per year here, based on 1,638 historical events on record.
62 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
Sutter County, CA · 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
9/25
20 declarations (0.7x state county average of 29)
Major Disaster Share Very High
19/25
15 of 20 declarations are major disasters (75%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
20/20
8 different disaster types declared in Sutter County
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Sutter 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
75%
Mostly major
NRI risk score
84
Relatively Moderate
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Sutter 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 | Very High | 65 modeled event-days per year |
| Earthquake | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 24 years |
| Heat Wave | Relatively Moderate | 7.7 modeled event-days per year |
| Wildfire | Relatively Low | roughly once every 289 years |
| Riverine Flooding | Relatively Low | roughly once every 2 years |
| Volcanic Activity | Very Low | roughly once every 10,000 years |
| Lightning | Relatively Low | an average of 8.4 times per year |
| Landslide | Very Low | an average of 3 times per year |
| Tornado | Very Low | roughly once every 12 years |
| Hail | Very Low | roughly once every 13 years |
| Strong Wind | Very Low | roughly once every 49 years |
| Winter Weather | Very Low | roughly once every 4 years |
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Modeled annualized frequency; drought and heat wave use event-days/year, December 2025 release
Disaster Types
Severe Storm 7
Flood 6
Biological 2
Dam/Levee Break 1
Hurricane 1
Freezing 1
Coastal Storm 1
Drought 1
What Severe Storm declarations mean here
Severe Storm is the most frequent declaration type on Sutter County's record, 35% 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 75.0%
of all 20 declarations
Emergency - 5 25.0%
of all 20 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 1 | |
| 2023 | 2 | |
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2017 | 3 | |
| 2006 | 1 | |
| 2005 | 1 | |
| 1998 | 1 | |
| 1997 | 1 | |
| 1995 | 2 | |
| 1991 | 1 | |
| 1986 | 1 | |
| 1983 | 1 | |
| 1977 | 1 | |
| 1970 | 1 | |
| 1965 | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4769 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS, TORNADOES, FLOODING, LANDSLIDES, AND MUDSLIDES | DR | Severe Storm | 2024-04-13 |
| 4683 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS, FLOODING, LANDSLIDES, AND MUDSLIDES | DR | Flood | 2023-01-14 |
| 3591 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS, FLOODING, AND MUDSLIDES | EM | Flood | 2023-01-09 |
| 4482 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-03-22 |
| 3428 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 4308 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS, FLOODING, AND MUDSLIDES | DR | Flood | 2017-04-01 |
| 4301 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS, FLOODING, AND MUDSLIDES | DR | Severe Storm | 2017-02-14 |
| 3381 | POTENTIAL FAILURE OF THE EMERGENCY SPILLWAY AT OROVILLE LAKE | EM | Dam/Levee Break | 2017-02-14 |
| 1628 | SEVERE STORMS, FLOODING, MUDSLIDES, AND LANDSLIDES | DR | Severe Storm | 2006-02-03 |
| 3248 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-13 |
| 1203 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 1998-02-09 |
| 1155 | SEVERE STORMS, FLOODING, MUD AND LANDSLIDES | DR | Severe Storm | 1997-01-04 |
| 1046 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS, FLOODING LANDSLIDES, MUD FLOW | DR | Severe Storm | 1995-03-12 |
| 1044 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS, FLOODING, LANDSLIDES, MUD FLOWS | DR | Severe Storm | 1995-01-10 |
| 894 | SEVERE FREEZE | DR | Freezing | 1991-02-11 |
| 758 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1986-02-21 |
| 677 | COASTAL STORMS, FLOODS, SLIDES & TORNADOES | DR | Coastal Storm | 1983-02-09 |
| 3023 | DROUGHT | EM | Drought | 1977-01-20 |
| 283 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1970-02-16 |
| 183 | HEAVY RAINS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1964-12-24 |
Storm Events in California
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Sutter County.
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| High Wind | 4,070 | 13 | 27 | $228.2M |
| Flood | 3,132 | 26 | 25 | $985.1M |
| Heavy Snow | 1,814 | 6 | 0 | $1.6M |
| Dense Fog | 1,605 | 52 | 148 | $2.8M |
| Drought | 1,421 | 0 | 0 | $0 |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
NFIP Flood Insurance Claims
Total Claims
199
Total Paid
$3.0M
Avg Per Claim
$15.3K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Relatively Moderate
Score: 83.7/100
Expected Annual Loss
Relatively Low
$44.8M/year
Social Vulnerability
Relatively Moderate
Community Resilience
Relatively Moderate
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Drought Very High
Earthquake Relatively Moderate
Heat Wave Relatively Moderate
Wildfire Relatively Low
Riverine Flooding Relatively Low
Volcanic Activity Very Low
Lightning Relatively Low
Landslide Very Low
Tornado Very Low
Hail Very Low
Strong Wind Very Low
Winter Weather Very Low
Cold Wave 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 Sutter County: the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Drought 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
Sutter County's closest FEMA peer: Fulton County, IL
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Sutter County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Sutter County shows 20 FEMA declarations, led by Severe Storm.
Similar Major-disaster share
Sutter County: 15 of 20 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Sutter County: NRI composite 83.7 (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 Sutter County - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for Sutter 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: 83.7 (Relatively Moderate).
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
Sutter County's NFIP claims file (199 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 Sutter County?
The most common disaster type in Sutter County is Severe Storm, with 7 declarations. Other disaster types include Flood (6), Biological (2), Dam/Levee Break (1).
How does Sutter County's FEMA declaration record compare with the California average?
The typical California county has 28.5 FEMA declaration records; Sutter County has 20, or 30% 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 Sutter County received?
Sutter County has received 15 major disaster declarations, representing 75% of all 20 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has Sutter County filed?
Sutter County has 199 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $3.0M in payments, with an average of $15.3K per claim.
What was the worst year for disasters in Sutter County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Sutter County was 2017, with 3 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1965 to 2024.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Sutter County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Sutter County, California has an overall risk score of 83.7 out of 100 (Relatively Moderate). The county's social vulnerability rating is Relatively Moderate and community resilience is Relatively Moderate. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Relatively Low, representing $44.8M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Sutter County?
The top hazard flagged by FEMA's NRI for Sutter County as of the latest release is Drought (risk rating: Very High). Other significant hazards include Earthquake (Relatively Moderate) and Heat Wave (Relatively Moderate). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts drought here at 65 modeled event-days per year, drawn from 1,638 historical events on record. The underlying methodology weighs historical event frequency against 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.
FEMA OpenFEMA declarations + NRI for Sutter County · vintage 2026-08-25 · Methodology · California profile · Verify with FEMA OpenFEMA · Verify with NOAA Storm Events