FEMA Records
19
Below median
Virginia · FEMA + NOAA + National Risk Index
Wise County, VA
19 FEMA disaster declarations (1977-2026), with a FEMA National Risk Index rating of Relatively Low. Most common hazard: Severe Storm.
- 19
- FEMA declarations
- 12
- Major disasters
- 50
- NRI risk · Relatively Low
- Severe Storm
- Top hazard
The verdict
Wise County has a nationally busy FEMA history: 19 declarations, more than 41% of counties in this registry. But the state comparison tempers that reading: the total is 7% below the Virginia county mean. FEMA's separate National Risk Index places the county in the riskiest 50%; that score models loss and vulnerability rather than counting declarations.
- Riskiest 50%
- of U.S. counties for FEMA National Risk Index score
- Relatively Low
- FEMA National Risk Index rating
- 19
- FEMA declarations vs 21 national county avg
- 348
- 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 51195 · Wise County 19 declarations · rank 1848/3,266
DECL-MID · MAJOR-MID · RANK-LOWER · PHOTO-FINISH · NRI-LOW · ACT-HIGH · TYPE-LEAD · VS-ST-BELOW
- DECL-MID 19
- MAJOR-MID 63%
- RANK-LOWER #1,848
- PHOTO-FINISH Bartow
- NRI-LOW 50
- ACT-HIGH High
- TYPE-LEAD Severe Storm
- VS-ST-BELOW -7%
Nearest declaration peer: Bartow, GA (0 declaration gap)
FEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2 filing stamps for this county register. Read with this county → · Virginia state profile
Wise County in the declaration-count neighbourhood
FEMA declaration records among Wise County and nearest peers by total count
- Los Angeles · largest
Los Angeles · largest
88 declarations
- Bartow · near 19
Bartow · near
19 declarations
- Union · near 19
Union · near
19 declarations
- Warren · near 19
Warren · near
19 declarations
- Wise · this county 19
Wise · this county
19 declarations
- Ujelang · smallest 1
Ujelang · smallest
1 declarations
What this shows Wise County carries 19 FEMA declaration records, ranked 1848 of 3,266 counties in this registry.
How Wise County's FEMA declaration count compares nationally
Wise County vs. all counties in this dataset
FEMA disaster declarations, all-time · Wise County
19 41st percentile higher than 41% 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
Wise County's FEMA Risk Index score
Which hazard drives modeled loss here?
FEMA's modeled annual dollar loss for Wise County is led by Riverine Flooding (about $9.1M Expected Annual Loss, Historical Loss Ratio Relatively Low), while Landslide 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 Wise County's hazard record show?
Reading the federal records together
The NFIP claims register shows a middle-volume loss record here: 348 paid claims, totaling $2.7M. PlainHazard uses 50-499 claims for this descriptive band; FEMA does not publish it as a safety or coverage category. The $7.7K average describes payments on recorded claims only, leaving uninsured damage and properties without a claim outside the measure.
Start with the state benchmark: a Virginia county averages 20.4 federal declaration records, while Wise County has 19. The gap is 7% 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 carries a high composite score on FEMA's National Risk Index, 50.4/100, rated Relatively Low. Its Expected Annual Loss rating is Very Low (roughly $13.2M in annualized losses), and a Relatively High social-vulnerability profile combined with Very Low community resilience shapes how much of that raw exposure becomes realized harm. Among the 18 modeled hazards, Landslide carries the county's highest rating, a mid-range Relatively Moderate. FEMA's modeled frequency puts that hazard at an average of 1.3 times per year here.
60 /100
Historical Activity Index
High historical activity
Wise County, 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
19 OpenFEMA declarations, full ingest window (0.9x national county average)
County Disaster Density Moderate
12/25
19 declarations (0.9x state county average of 20)
Major Disaster Share High
16/25
12 of 19 declarations are major disasters (63%)
Hazard Diversity Very High
18/20
7 different disaster types declared in Wise County
FEMA NRI 8-hazard radar - Wise 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
63%
Major-heavy
NRI risk score
50
Relatively Low
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Per-county per-hazard ratings, December 2025 release
How often does each hazard strike Wise 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 |
|---|---|---|
| Landslide | Relatively Moderate | an average of 1.3 times per year |
| Wildfire | Relatively Low | roughly once every 87 years |
| Cold Wave | Relatively Moderate | an average of 2.2 times per year |
| Avalanche | Relatively Low | roughly once every 100 years |
| Riverine Flooding | Relatively Low | roughly once every 1 years |
| Winter Weather | Relatively Moderate | an average of 15 times per year |
| Earthquake | Very Low | roughly once every 602 years |
| Strong Wind | Relatively Moderate | an average of 3.9 times per year |
| Hurricane | Very Low | roughly once every 61 years |
| Drought | Very Low | 8 modeled event-days per year |
| Tornado | Very Low | roughly once every 16 years |
| Lightning | Very Low | an average of 51 times per year |
| Hail | Very Low | an average of 3 times per year |
| Ice Storm | Very Low | roughly once every 7 years |
Source: FEMA National Risk Index Modeled annualized frequency; drought and heat wave use event-days/year, December 2025 release
Disaster Types
Severe Storm 6
Snowstorm 4
Hurricane 3
Tropical Storm 2
Biological 2
Winter Storm 1
Flood 1
What Severe Storm declarations mean here
Severe Storm is the most frequent declaration type on Wise County's record, 32% 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 - 12 63.2%
of all 19 declarations
Emergency - 7 36.8%
of all 19 declarations
FEMA Declarations Timeline
| Year | Declarations | |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | 1 | |
| 2025 | 2 | |
| 2024 | 1 | |
| 2020 | 2 | |
| 2018 | 1 | |
| 2013 | 1 | |
| 2010 | 1 | |
| 2005 | 1 | |
| 2003 | 1 | |
| 2002 | 2 | |
| 2001 | 1 | |
| 2000 | 1 | |
| 1996 | 1 | |
| 1994 | 1 | |
| 1993 | 1 | |
Show 1 earlier declaration years
| 1977 | 1 | |
Disaster Declarations
How the 19 FEMA declarations break into federal action codes (DR / EM / FM). Same DISTINCT grain as the table below.
Download these 19 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 |
| 4863 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2025-04-04 |
| 4831 | TROPICAL STORM HELENE | DR | Tropical Storm | 2024-10-01 |
| 3621 | POST-TROPICAL CYCLONE HELENE | EM | Tropical Storm | 2024-09-29 |
| 4512 | COVID-19 PANDEMIC | DR | Biological | 2020-04-02 |
| 3448 | COVID-19 | EM | Biological | 2020-03-13 |
| 3403 | HURRICANE FLORENCE | EM | Hurricane | 2018-09-11 |
| 3359 | HURRICANE SANDY | EM | Hurricane | 2012-10-29 |
| 1874 | SEVERE WINTER STORM AND SNOWSTORM | DR | Snowstorm | 2010-02-16 |
| 3240 | HURRICANE KATRINA EVACUATION | EM | Hurricane | 2005-09-12 |
| 1458 | SEVERE WINTER STORM, RECORD/NEAR RECORD SNOWFALL, HEAVY RAIN,FLOODIND, AND MUDSLIDE | DR | Severe Storm | 2003-03-27 |
| 1411 | SEVERE STORMS, TORNADOES, AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2002-05-05 |
| 1406 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2002-04-02 |
| 1386 | SEVERE STORMS AND FLOODING | DR | Severe Storm | 2001-07-12 |
| 1318 | SEVERE WINTER STORMS | DR | Severe Storm | 2000-02-28 |
| 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 |
| 530 | SEVERE STORMS & FLOODING | DR | Flood | 1977-04-07 |
Storm Events in Virginia
Statewide NOAA context only. PlainHazard does not currently attribute these state totals to Wise County.
| 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
348
Total Paid
$2.7M
Avg Per Claim
$7.7K
Source: FEMA National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) OpenFEMA Claims Data
FEMA National Risk Index
Overall Risk
Relatively Low
Score: 50.4/100
Expected Annual Loss
Very Low
$13.2M/year
Social Vulnerability
Relatively High
Community Resilience
Very Low
Hazard Risk Breakdown
Landslide Relatively Moderate
Wildfire Relatively Low
Cold Wave Relatively Moderate
Avalanche Relatively Low
Riverine Flooding Relatively Low
Winter Weather Relatively Moderate
Earthquake Very Low
Strong Wind Relatively Moderate
Hurricane Very Low
Drought Very Low
Tornado Very Low
Lightning Very Low
Hail Very Low
Ice Storm Very Low
Heat 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: Landslide
Landslide risk is a function of slope, soil and water, so it is usually a SECOND-ORDER hazard: it is triggered by the rainfall, snowmelt, wildfire burn scars or seismic shaking that came first. That is why a county can carry high landslide exposure whose realized damage is recorded under a flood or storm declaration instead.
Worth noting for Wise County: the model and the federal record do NOT point at the same hazard. Landslide carries the highest modeled rating (Relatively Moderate), 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
Wise County's closest FEMA peer: Decatur County, GA
Comparisons use published FEMA declaration fields plus the National Risk Index composite for Wise County. Record similarity, not a safety rating.
Closest declaration profiles
Wise County shows 19 FEMA declarations, led by Severe Storm.
Similar Major-disaster share
Wise County: 12 of 19 of its declarations are Major.
Similar modeled NRI score
Wise County: NRI composite 50.4 (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 Wise County - capture-dated entries only.
Compare beyond this state
Nationwide peers by NRI score & FEMA declaration volume
Two PlainHazard-derived comparison paths for Wise 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: 50.4 (Relatively Low).
Similar declaration volume
Nearest out-of-state counties by FEMA declaration count. This county: 19. NRI peers are excluded so the two link sets stay distinct.
Further reading for this county
Understanding disaster data
Wise County's NFIP claims file (348 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 Wise County?
The most common disaster type in Wise County is Severe Storm, with 6 declarations. Other disaster types include Snowstorm (4), Hurricane (3), Tropical Storm (2).
How does Wise County's FEMA declaration record compare with the Virginia average?
The typical Virginia county has 20.4 FEMA declaration records; Wise County has 19, or 7% fewer. Against the national county mean of 20.7, this county's total is 8% lower. The comparison is historical and says nothing about the probability of a future event.
How many major FEMA disaster declarations has Wise County received?
Wise County has received 12 major disaster declarations, representing 63% of all 19 disaster declarations.
How many flood insurance claims has Wise County filed?
Wise County has 348 National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) claims totaling $2.7M in payments, with an average of $7.7K per claim.
Does FEMA's top risk-rated hazard match the highest Expected Annual Loss in Wise County?
No. In Wise County, Landslide has the highest National Risk Index rating (Relatively Moderate), while Riverine Flooding leads Expected Annual Loss at about $9.1M. FEMA's risk score and dollar-loss model use different inputs, so the leaders often differ.
What was the worst year for disasters in Wise County?
The most active year for disaster declarations in Wise County was 2002, with 2 declarations. The county has FEMA disaster data spanning 1977 to 2026.
What is the FEMA National Risk Index score for Wise County?
According to the FEMA National Risk Index, Wise County, Virginia has an overall risk score of 50.4 out of 100 (Relatively Low). Social vulnerability here rates Relatively High, while community resilience comes in at Very Low. The Expected Annual Loss (EAL) score is Very Low, representing $13.2M in annualized losses.
Which natural hazard poses the greatest risk to Wise County?
Based on FEMA NRI data, the highest-risk natural hazard in Wise County is Landslide (risk rating: Relatively Moderate). Other significant hazards include Wildfire (Relatively Low) and Cold Wave (Relatively Moderate). FEMA's modeled event frequency puts landslide here at an average of 1.3 times per year. 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.
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 Wise County · vintage 2026-08-25 · Methodology · Virginia profile · Verify with FEMA OpenFEMA · Verify with NOAA Storm Events