Lubbock County, Texas: hazard history

FEMA declared 20 disasters that named Lubbock County between 1970 and 2021.

Most recent declarations

• DR-4586 2021 · Severe Ice Storm · Severe Winter Storms
• EM-3554 2021 · Severe Ice Storm · Severe Winter Storm
• EM-3458 2020 · Biological · Covid-19
• DR-4485 2020 · Biological · Covid-19 Pandemic
• DR-4255 2015 · Severe Storm · Severe Winter Storms, Tornadoes, Straight-line Winds, And Flooding
• DR-4223 2015 · Severe Storm · Severe Storms, Tornadoes, Straight-line Winds And Flooding
• DR-1931 2010 · Hurricane · Hurricane Alex
• EM-3294 2008 · Hurricane · Hurricane Ike
• EM-3290 2008 · Hurricane · Hurricane Gustav
• EM-3284 2008 · Fire · Wildfires

Not counted above: 102 statewide declarations, which covered every county in Texas. 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 Lubbock County each year. The busiest year was 2012, with 77 records.

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

Costliest records

1. Thunderstorm Wind · Jun 5, 2013$400.0M
   NOAA name: Lubbock County · NOAA record 445001
2. Drought · Jul 1, 2011$250.0M
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · NOAA record 320625
3. Drought · Jun 1, 2011$200.0M
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · NOAA record 308394
4. Hail · May 8, 2015$200.0M
   NOAA name: Lubbock County · NOAA record 567053
5. Hail · May 20, 2020$100.0M
   NOAA name: Lubbock County · NOAA record 885048

Deadliest records

1. Winter Weather · Nov 16, 20142 deaths
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · NOAA record 543932
2. Blizzard · Dec 26, 20152 deaths
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · $12.0M damage · NOAA record 606345
3. Winter Weather · Jan 10, 20202 deaths
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · NOAA record 865838
4. High Wind · Mar 20, 20061 death
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · $190K damage · 9 injuries · NOAA record 5496426
5. Winter Weather · Dec 29, 20091 death
   NOAA name: NWS forecast zone · $20K damage · NOAA record 201253

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 $2.7M on 344 claims in Lubbock County from 1979 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 Lubbock 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 Lubbock 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 1,265 records, 884 were filed against this county and 381 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: 1% of Texas'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.