FEMA Records
26
High volume
Texas · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Williamson County, TX
26 FEMA disaster declarations (1975-2025), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Relatively Moderate. Most common hazard: Fire.
- 26
- FEMA declarations
- 13
- Major disasters
- 90
- NRI risk · Relatively Moderate
- Fire
- Top hazard
The verdict
Two federal records point in the busier direction for Williamson County. Its 26 FEMA declarations are 24% above the Texas county mean and exceed the count for 75% of the 3,266 counties in this registry. Separately, FEMA's National Risk Index places it in the riskiest 10%, based on modeled expected annual loss, social vulnerability, and community resilience.
- Riskiest 10%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Relatively Moderate
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 26
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 741
- 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 48491 · Williamson County 26 declarations · rank 725/3,266
DECL-HEAVY · MAJOR-MID · RANK-MID · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-MID · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-ABOVE
- DECL-HEAVY 26
- MAJOR-MID 50%
- RANK-MID #725
- PHOTO-FINISH Hunterdon
- NRI-MID 90
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Fire
- VS-ST-ABOVE +24%
Nearest declaration peer: Hunterdon, NJ (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · Texas state profile
Williamson County among high-volume declaration counties
FEMA declaration records among Williamson County and nearest peers by total count
- Los Angeles · largest
Los Angeles · largest
88 declarations
- Hunterdon · near 26
Hunterdon · near
26 declarations
- Pierce · near 26
Pierce · near
26 declarations
- San Sebastián · near 26
San Sebastián · near
26 declarations
- Williamson · this county 26
Williamson · this county
26 declarations
- Ujelang · smallest 1
Ujelang · smallest
1 declarations
What this shows Williamson County carries 26 FEMA declaration records, ranked 725 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
Where Williamson County ranks in the national declaration registry
Williamson County vs. high-volume counties in this registry
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time · Williamson County
26 Top 25% higher than 75% 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
Williamson County's FEMA Risk Index score
Which hazard drives modeled loss here?
FEMA's modeled annual dollar loss for Williamson County is led by Riverine Flooding (about $71.0M Expected Annual Loss, Historical Loss Ratio Relatively Moderate), while Hail carries the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively 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 Williamson County's hazard record show?
Reading the federal records together
FEMA's NFIP table contains a substantial paid-claim history for this county: 741 claims and $22.3M 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 $30.0K. 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. Williamson County's 26 federal records stand 24% above the Texas county mean of 20.9. 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 90.1/100 (Relatively Moderate). Expected Annual Loss is rated Relatively Moderate (roughly $136.6M in annualized losses). Social vulnerability reads Very Low and community resilience Very High, both critical modifiers of realized harm here. Of the 18 hazards FEMA models, Hail stands out as the sharpest exposure here, rated Relatively High. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at an average of 4 times per year here, based on 150 historical events on record.
68 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
Williamson County, TX · 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
19/30
26 OpenFEMA declarations, full ingest window (1.3x national county average)
County Disaster Density High
16/25
26 declarations (1.2x state county average of 21)
Major Disaster Share High
13/25
13 of 26 declarations are major disasters (50%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
20/20
9 different disaster types declared in Williamson County
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Williamson 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
50%
Major-heavy
NRI risk score
90
Relatively Moderate
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Williamson 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Hail | Relatively High | an average of 4 times per year |
| Winter Weather | Very High | an average of 3.7 times per year |
| Cold Wave | Relatively High | roughly once every 2 years |
| Tornado | Relatively High | roughly once every 2 years |
| Riverine Flooding | Relatively Moderate | an average of 3.6 times per year |
| Heat Wave | Relatively Moderate | 10 modeled event-days per year |
| Lightning | Relatively High | an average of 49 times per year |
| Wildfire | Relatively Low | roughly once every 963 years |
| Ice Storm | Relatively Moderate | roughly once every 2 years |
| Drought | Relatively Moderate | 59 modeled event-days per year |
| Hurricane | Relatively Low | roughly once every 27 years |
| Strong Wind | Relatively Moderate | an average of 1.7 times per year |
| Earthquake | Very Low | roughly once every 2,160 years |
| Landslide | Very Low | roughly once every 8 years |
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Modeled annualized frequency; drought and heat wave use event-days/year, December 2025 release
Disaster Types
Fire 8
Severe Storm 4
Hurricane 4
Flood 3
Severe Ice Storm 2
Biological 2
Winter Storm 1
Other 1
Drought 1
What Fire declarations mean here
Fire is the most frequent declaration type on Williamson County's record, 31% of its declarations. Wildfire is the one hazard here with its own dedicated federal instrument: the Fire Management Assistance Grant, which appears in this data as an FM record. An FMAG can be authorised while a fire is still burning, on a timescale of hours, because its purpose is to reimburse the cost of fighting a fire that threatens to become a major disaster.
That distinction matters when comparing counties. An FM declaration is not a presidential major disaster declaration and does not carry the same assistance programmes, so a fire-heavy county's total is not directly comparable with a hurricane-heavy county's total unless the declaration types are separated, which is why they are listed separately on this page.
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 50.0%
of all 26 declarations
Emergency - 9 34.6%
of all 26 declarations
Fire Management - 4 15.4%
of all 26 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 1 | |
| 2023 | 1 | |
| 2021 | 2 | |
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2015 | 1 | |
| 2011 | 4 | |
| 2008 | 3 | |
| 2007 | 1 | |
| 2006 | 1 | |
| 2005 | 3 | |
| 2003 | 1 | |
| 1999 | 1 | |
| 1998 | 1 | |
| 1993 | 1 | |
| 1992 | 1 | |
Show 2 earlier declaration years
| 1989 | 1 | |
| 1975 | 1 | |
Disaster Declarations
How the 26 FEMA declarations break into federal action codes (DR / EM / FM). Same DISTINCT grain as the table below.
Download these 26 declarations as CSV . FEMA source data is public domain; our derived presentation is CC0.
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4879 | SEVERE STORMS, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS, AND FLOODING | DR | Flood | 2025-07-06 |
| 4705 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | DR | Winter Storm | 2023-04-21 |
| 4586 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | DR | Severe Ice Storm | 2021-02-19 |
| 3554 | SEVERE WINTER STORM | EM | Severe Ice Storm | 2021-02-14 |
| 4485 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-03-25 |
| 3458 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 4223 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, STRAIGHT-LINE WINDS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2015-05-29 |
| 4029 | WILDFIRES | DR | Fire | 2011-09-09 |
| 2963 | MOONGLOW FIRE | FM | Fire | 2011-09-06 |
| 2949 | HORSESHOE FIRE | FM | Fire | 2011-08-15 |
| 2922 | GRAND MESA FIRE | FM | Fire | 2011-06-16 |
| 3294 | HURRICANE IKE | EM | Hurricane | 2008-09-10 |
| 2785 | FLORENCE FIRE | FM | Fire | 2008-08-07 |
| 3284 | WILDFIRES | EM | Fire | 2008-03-14 |
| 1709 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2007-06-29 |
| 1624 | EXTREME WILDFIRE THREAT | DR | Fire | 2006-01-11 |
| 1606 | HURRICANE RITA | DR | Hurricane | 2005-09-24 |
| 3261 | HURRICANE RITA | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-21 |
| 3216 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-02 |
| 3171 | LOSS OF THE SPACE SHUTTLE COLUMBIA | EM | Other | 2003-02-01 |
Show 6 earlier declaration records
| DR# | Title | Type | Incident | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3142 | EXTREME FIRE HAZARDS | EM | Fire | 1999-09-01 |
| 1239 | TROPICAL STORM CHARLEY | DR | Severe Storm | 1998-08-26 |
| 3113 | EXTREME FIRE HAZARD | EM | Drought | 1993-09-10 |
| 930 | SEVERE THUNDERSTORMS | DR | Flood | 1991-12-26 |
| 828 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES & FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 1989-05-19 |
| 454 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1974-11-30 |
Storm Events in Texas
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Williamson County.
| Storm Type | Events | Fatalities | Injuries | Property Damage |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hail | 14,072 | 0 | 15 | $7.4B |
| Thunderstorm Wind | 10,293 | 41 | 141 | $369.9M |
| Drought | 7,032 | 0 | 0 | $86.0K |
| Flash Flood | 4,728 | 338 | 24 | $47.6B |
| Heat | 4,079 | 119 | 405 | $0 |
Source: NOAA Storm Events Database State-level aggregated data, 2015-2025
NFIP Flood Insurance Claims
Total Claims
741
Total Paid
$22.3M
Avg Per Claim
$30.0K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Relatively Moderate
Score: 90.1/100
Expected Annual Loss
Relatively Moderate
$136.6M/year
Social Vulnerability
Very Low
Community Resilience
Very High
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Hail Relatively High
Winter Weather Very High
Cold Wave Relatively High
Tornado Relatively High
Riverine Flooding Relatively Moderate
Heat Wave Relatively Moderate
Lightning Relatively High
Wildfire Relatively Low
Ice Storm Relatively Moderate
Drought Relatively Moderate
Hurricane Relatively Low
Strong Wind Relatively Moderate
Earthquake Very Low
Landslide Very Low
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: Hail
Hail is among the most expensive hazards in the model relative to how little it threatens life. It concentrates on roofs, vehicles and crops, and a single severe storm can generate an insurance loss across a metropolitan area without a single injury.
Worth noting for Williamson County: the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Hail carries the highest modeled rating (Relatively High), while the county's declaration history is led by Fire. 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
Williamson County's closest FEMA peer: Marlboro County, SC
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Williamson County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Williamson County shows 26 FEMA declarations, led by Fire.
Similar Major-disaster share
Williamson County: 13 of 26 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Williamson County: NRI composite 90.1 (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 Williamson County - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for Williamson 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: 90.1 (Relatively Moderate).
Similar declaration volume
Nearest out-of-state counties by FEMA declaration count. This county: 26. NRI peers are excluded so the two link sets stay distinct.
Further reading for this county
Understanding disaster data
Williamson County's NFIP claims file (741 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 Williamson County?
The most common disaster type in Williamson County is Fire, with 8 declarations. Other disaster types include Severe Storm (4), Hurricane (4), Flood (3).
How does Williamson County's FEMA declaration record compare with the Texas average?
FEMA lists 26 declaration records for Williamson County. That is 24% above the Texas county mean of 20.9. Its count is also 25% 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 Williamson County received?
Williamson County has received 13 major disaster declarations, representing 50% of all 26 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has Williamson County filed?
Williamson County has 741 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $22.3M in payments, with an average of $30.0K per claim.
Does FEMA's top risk-rated hazard match the highest Expected Annual Loss in Williamson County?
No. In Williamson County, Hail has the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively High), while Riverine Flooding leads Expected Annual Loss at about $71.0M. FEMA's risk score and dollar-loss model use different inputs, so the leaders often differ.
What was the worst year for disasters in Williamson County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Williamson County was 2011, with 4 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1975 to 2025.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Williamson County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Williamson County, Texas has an overall risk score of 90.1 out of 100 (Relatively Moderate). The county's social vulnerability rating is Very Low and community resilience is Very High. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Relatively Moderate, representing $136.6M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Williamson County?
Based on FEMA NRI data, the highest-risk natural hazard in Williamson County is Hail (risk rating: Relatively High). Other significant hazards include Winter Weather (Very High) and Cold Wave (Relatively High). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts hail here at an average of 4 times per year, drawn from 150 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 Williamson County · vintage 2026-08-25 · Methodology · Texas profile · Verify with FEMA OpenFEMA · Verify with NOAA Storm Events