440 flood insurance claims·$4.7M paid·4 federal flood & hurricane disasters
Share of the whole county outline, rivers and lakes included; parts FEMA hasn’t mapped count as zero.
Shaded areas are FEMA’s mapped flood hazard zones in and around Forsyth County, North Carolina. Zoomed out they are simplified; at street level the map switches to FEMA’s exact layer. Tap anywhere to check that spot, or search an address above.
Flash flooding from convective storms dominates the flood risk profile in Forsyth County, accounting for the vast majority of local severe weather events over the last 30 years alongside occasional tropical systems, hurricanes, and general floods. Recent activity includes a January 2024 low-pressure system that brought widespread showers, thunderstorms, and tree damage, as well as a July 2022 cold front event that triggered scattered evening and overnight storms producing downed trees and flash flooding across the northwest Piedmont.
National Flood Insurance Program records show claims distributed across multiple zones with varying severity. Zone A accounts for the highest claim volume with 248 filings, averaging an $15,094 payout and an average recorded water depth of 5 inches. Zone X recorded 153 claims with an average payout of $15,702 and an average recorded water depth of 11 inches. Additional claims occurred in Zone X_UNSHADED (27 claims, average payout $7,420, average water depth 5 inches), Zone X_SHADED (7 claims, average payout $8,290, average water depth 6 inches), and Zone D (3 claims, average payout $3,354, average water depth 4 inches).
Property owners in Zone A and Zone X should pay the closest attention to these risks, given that they represent the highest concentrations of historical insurance claims and water depths in the county.
Summary written from NOAA storm reports and NFIP claims for this county. Not a prediction.
12% of Forsyth County’s flood insurance claims were on properties rated outside FEMA’s high-risk zones.
282 NFIP claims with a recorded rated flood zone, 1978 to date. The zone is the one FEMA used to rate that policy, which may not match today’s map. Source: OpenFEMA NFIP claims.
In flood insurance claims here that reported a flood depth, the average was 7 inches.
Drawn to scale against an 80-inch door. Even a few inches soaks flooring, the bottom of the drywall and anything plugged in near the floor.
Average of the depths reported on claims (zero and implausible values left out); FEMA’s record doesn’t say exactly where each depth was measured. Source: OpenFEMA NFIP claims.
The worst year was 2018, with 39 claims and $722,831 paid, the year of Hurricane Florence and Tropical Storm Michael.
Bar height is scaled by square root so ordinary years stay visible next to the worst one. NFIP claims by year of loss. Source: OpenFEMA.
26 NOAA storm reports from Forsyth County describe what happened, in the words of the forecasters who covered it. Read the North Carolina flood stories →
25 federal disaster declarations since 1977, 4 of them floods, coastal storms or hurricanes.
| Disaster | Began |
|---|---|
| Severe Winter Storm | Jan 21, 2026 |
| Hurricane Helene | Sep 25, 2024 |
| Tropical Storm Helene | Sep 25, 2024 |
| Tropical Storm Debby | Aug 5, 2024 |
| Hurricane Ian | Sep 28, 2022 |
| Hurricane Isaias | Jul 31, 2020 |
| Hurricane Dorian | Sep 1, 2019 |
| Tropical Storm Michael | Oct 10, 2018 |
Weather and water disasters only; most recent first. Source: OpenFEMA Disaster Declarations.
70 since 1996: 59 flash floods and 3 river or area floods.
| Event | Date | Damage |
|---|---|---|
| Flash Flood | Jan 9, 2024 | — |
| Tropical Storm | Sep 30, 2022 | $1.0M |
| Flash Flood | Jul 5, 2022 | $10,000 |
| Flash Flood | Jul 5, 2022 | — |
| Flash Flood | Jul 2, 2022 | — |
| Flash Flood | Jul 1, 2021 | — |
| Tropical Storm | Oct 29, 2020 | $1.5M |
| Flash Flood | Aug 14, 2020 | — |
— = no damage estimate in the record. Source: NOAA Storm Events Database.
Flash Flood · Jan 9, 2024. A potent area of low pressure moved through the Gulf Coast states into the Southeast United States. Widespread gusty winds developed across North Carolina ahead of this low, and a line of showers and thunderstorms swept through North Carolina during the afternoon and evening hours. Widespread tree damage was associated with this event, both within the gradient winds ahead of the thunderstorms, and the convective l…
Tropical Storm · Sep 30, 2022. Hurricane Ian made landfall along the South Carolina coast near Georgetown during the early afternoon hours of September 30, 2022. Widespread wind gusts over tropical storm force and heavy rainfall occurred across much of central North Carolina through the afternoon and evening hours. There were numerous reports of wind damage and power outages as a result of the storm.
Flash Flood · Jul 5, 2022. A warm front draped from the Great Lakes into the Ohio Valley led to morning showers and thunderstorms across the Ohio Valley early in the day. These showers and storms continued to progress southward toward central North Carolina in the evening hours, especially across the northwest, central, and southern Piedmont. The storms did not completely clear the area until the early overnight hours, as storms by then mov…
Flash Flood · Jul 2, 2022. A mid-level trough across the Great Lakes helped push a weak cold front into the central North Carolina Piedmont during the evening and overnight hours. Ahead of the front, storms over the Ohio Valley and West Virginia produced additional surface boundaries across the northern Piedmont. The approach of the front led to development of scattered to numerous showers and storms across the northwest Piedmont in the lat…
National Weather Service narratives, lightly trimmed. Source: NOAA Storm Events Database.
Every colour on the map above is a place on this drawing: where the ground sits relative to the flood FEMA plans for.
If a building in Forsyth County is in a high-risk zone (A or V) and its mortgage comes from a federally regulated or insured lender, or is federally backed, flood insurance is required.
Outside those zones it is optional, and often worth having: from 2014 to 2024 nearly one-third of NFIP claims came from outside the high-risk Special Flood Hazard Area. Since Risk Rating 2.0, NFIP premiums are set for each building, so the only reliable price is a quote: FloodSmart.gov or a local agent.