5,248 flood insurance claims·$84.9M paid·10 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 Dauphin County, Pennsylvania. 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 floods and river floods driven by slow-moving thunderstorms and heavy rainfall dominate the flood history of Dauphin County. Over the last 30 years, the NOAA Storm Events Database recorded 42 flash flood events, 36 general flood events resulting in 5 deaths, and 1 tropical storm. Recent events include a May 2025 flash flood caused by a slow-moving line of showers and thunderstorms ahead of a cold front, and a June 2025 flood produced by multiple clusters of thunderstorms forming in an extremely moist and unstable environment along a slow-moving warm front.
National Flood Insurance Program records indicate that flood risks extend beyond high-risk zones. Zone A accounts for the highest impact with 4,018 claims, an average payout of $21,176, and an average recorded water depth of 16 inches. However, properties in shaded and unshaded Zone X areas also experience significant vulnerability, recording hundreds of claims with average water depths ranging between 12 and 14 inches and average payouts exceeding $12,000.
Homeowners, journalists, and real estate agents should pay the closest attention to properties located within Zone A, as well as those in Zone X designations where historical claims confirm that damaging water accumulations still occur.
Summary written from NOAA storm reports and NFIP claims for this county. Not a prediction.
15% of Dauphin County’s flood insurance claims were on properties rated outside FEMA’s high-risk zones.
4,730 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 15 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 2011, with 1,836 claims and $50.8M paid, the year of Tropical Storm Lee and Remnants Of Tropical Storm Lee.
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.
11 NOAA storm reports from Dauphin County describe what happened, in the words of the forecasters who covered it. Read the Pennsylvania flood stories →
22 federal disaster declarations since 1972, 10 of them floods, coastal storms or hurricanes.
| Disaster | Began |
|---|---|
| Remnants Of Hurricane Ida | Aug 31, 2021 |
| Severe Winter Storm And Snowstorm | Jan 22, 2016 |
| Hurricane Sandy | Oct 26, 2012 |
| Remnants Of Tropical Storm Lee | Sep 3, 2011 |
| Tropical Storm Lee | Sep 3, 2011 |
| Severe Winter Storms And Snowstorms | Feb 5, 2010 |
| Severe Storms, Flooding, And Mudslides | Jun 23, 2006 |
| Hurricane Katrina | Aug 29, 2005 |
Weather and water disasters only; most recent first. Source: OpenFEMA Disaster Declarations.
79 since 1996: 42 flash floods and 36 river or area floods.
| Event | Date | Damage |
|---|---|---|
| Flood | Jun 30, 2025 | — |
| Flash Flood | May 6, 2025 | — |
| Flash Flood | Sep 21, 2024 | — |
| Flash Flood | Sep 21, 2024 | $100,000 |
| Flash Flood | Jul 17, 2021 | — |
| Flash Flood | Jul 11, 2021 | — |
| Flash Flood | Aug 11, 2021 | — |
| Flash Flood | Sep 1, 2021 | — |
— = no damage estimate in the record. Source: NOAA Storm Events Database.
Flood · Jun 30, 2025. A slow-moving warm front in an extremely moist (PWAT values exceeding 2.00, values closer to 2.25 across the Lower Susquehanna Valley) and unstable environment allowed for multiple clusters of thunderstorms to begin to form during the late morning hours and continue through the late evening hours of June 30, 2025. A shortwave trough stationed across the region allowed for enhanced lift, with relatively weak shear…
Flash Flood · May 6, 2025. Low pressure stationed across the Delmarva during the early morning hours of May 6, 2025 began to lift north and east during the afternoon hours, allowing portions of eastern Pennsylvania to have a brief period of residence time in the warm sector. This residence time allowed for destabilization ahead of a surface cold front, with ample shear in place to allow for a line of showers and thunderstorms to slowly lift…
Flash Flood · Sep 21, 2024. A warm front approaching central Pennsylvania in an environment of sufficient instability and shear allowed for thunderstorm formation during the late afternoon and evening hours, with multiple rounds of severe thunderstorms crossing the northern tier of Pennsylvania. The multiple rounds of heavy rainfall, coupled with local topography, allowed for flash flooding across hydrologically sensitive areas of Potter and…
Flash Flood · Jul 17, 2021. Scattered showers and thunderstorms develop during the early afternoon hours of July 17, 2021 across western Pennsylvania and in the Lower Susquehanna Valley in an anomalously humid airmass ahead of an approaching cold front. The storms over the Lower Susquehanna Valley developed on a weak boundary in a high CAPE environment, and produced sporadic wind damage before moving to the east. The storms over western Penn…
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 Dauphin 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.