Lincoln County, Colorado: hazard history

FEMA declared 10 disasters that named Lincoln County between 1965 and 2023.

Most recent declarations

• DR-4731 2023 · Flood · Severe Storms, Flooding, And Tornadoes
• DR-4498 2020 · Biological · Covid-19 Pandemic
• EM-3436 2020 · Biological · Covid-19
• DR-4145 2013 · Flood · Severe Storms, Flooding, Landslides, And Mudslides
• EM-3224 2005 · Coastal Storm · Hurricane Katrina Evacuation
• DR-1421 2002 · Fire · Wildfires
• DR-1374 2001 · Severe Storm · Severe Winter Storms
• DR-1186 1997 · Flood · Severe Storms, Heavy Rain, Flash Floods, Flooding, Mudslides
• EM-3025 1977 · Drought · Drought
• DR-200 1965 · Tornado · Tornadoes, Severe Storms & Flooding

Not counted above: 12 statewide declarations, which covered every county in Colorado. A declaration is a decision to send federal help, not a measure of how bad an event was. Records run from 1953. Source: FEMA OpenFEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries.

Records start in 1996. Damage is NOAA's estimate at the time, in nominal dollars, and is often rounded; it is not insurance claims data. A storm that crossed two NOAA zones in this county is recorded, and counted, once per zone. A storm filed against a forecast zone is counted in every county that zone covers, with the whole storm's damage; do not add these figures across counties.

NOAA storm event records in Lincoln County each year. The busiest year was 2025, with 78 records.

Years with no record are left out of the table, not shown as zero.

Costliest records

1. Tornado · May 31, 1999$4.0M
   NOAA name: Lincoln County · NOAA record 5699026
2. High Wind · May 20, 2001$345K
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · NOAA record 5250138
3. High Wind · Jan 19, 2009$250K
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · 2 deaths · NOAA record 150246
4. Flash Flood · Jul 16, 2014$250K
   NOAA name: Lincoln County · NOAA record 532534
5. Tornado · Aug 17, 2015$100K
   NOAA name: Lincoln County · NOAA record 595996

Deadliest records

1. High Wind · Jan 19, 20092 deaths
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · $250K damage · NOAA record 150246
2. Winter Weather · Dec 19, 20112 deaths
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · NOAA record 357315
3. Winter Storm · Oct 10, 20051 death
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · NOAA record 5478526
4. Dust Storm · Jan 15, 20211 death
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · NOAA record 937867

Each line is one NOAA record, linked to its page at NOAA. One large storm can appear more than once if NOAA recorded it in several zones of this county. Dollars are nominal.

The National Flood Insurance Program paid $4K on 6 claims in Lincoln County from 1990 to 2023.

A count of claims, not a rate: NFIP publishes no count of insured homes beside it, and most flood damage is uninsured. Nominal dollars. Records run from 1978 to 2024; claims filed without a county code are not on any county page. Source: FEMA OpenFEMA FIMA NFIP Redacted Claims.

A hazard vulnerability analysis rates each hazard for probability, impact, preparedness and response. Probability is the one column the county’s federal record can fill — NCEI storm events from 1996 to 2026 and FEMA declarations naming the county — and this is what it says for a facility here, on the 0–3 scale of the all-hazards structure surveyors expect. The other six columns are the facility’s own judgment about its building, and Calchis leaves them blank.

A dash means the record does not speak to that hazard; it is not a zero. Whether a finished document satisfies the CMS Emergency Preparedness Rule is the facility’s finding and its surveyor’s. Complete the HVA for a facility in Lincoln County — the technological, human and hazardous-materials rows, the six facility columns, the approval and the printed document — or read the sample analysis on that page first.

• Every figure is counted from public federal records held by Calchis: NOAA NCEI Storm Events, FEMA OpenFEMA Disaster Declarations, and FEMA NFIP claims. Nothing is modeled or estimated.
• NOAA files some events against a county and others against an NWS forecast zone, and publishes a code for both. Records are counted as Lincoln County by that code — county records by the county's own FIPS code, zone records through the National Weather Service's published list of which counties each zone covers. No name matching is involved. Of 916 records, 694 were filed against this county and 222 against a forecast zone covering it. A zone storm is counted in every county its zone covers, and its damage figure is the whole storm's, not this county's share — NOAA does not publish that split. So these figures describe this county; they must not be added up across counties. Left out: 0% of Colorado's NOAA records, which are marine zones or zones NWS does not map to a county.
• Counts last rebuilt from the source records on Sep 15, 2026.