66 flood insurance claims·$624,674 paid·7 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 Cherokee County, Texas. 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 heavy rainfall events dominates the flood risk profile in Cherokee County, Texas, backed by 67 recorded flash flood events alongside 11 standard flood events, one tropical storm, and one hurricane over the last 30 years.
Recent occurrences are illustrated by heavy rainfall and thunderstorms along a slow-moving cold front in April 2025 and May 2025, which brought widespread rainfall totals of 2 to 5+ inches and triggered flash flooding across the region.
Property owners and real estate professionals should pay the closest attention to locations within FEMA Zone A, which accounts for the highest claim volume in the county with 37 claims averaging a payout of $14,492 and an average recorded water depth of 16 inches. Properties located in Zone X and Zone X Unshaded also require attention, having logged 18 claims averaging $23,863 with an average water depth of 5 inches, and 8 claims averaging $2,370 with an average water depth of 2 inches, respectively. Additional claims include Zone V with 2 claims averaging $4,905 with an average water depth of 5 inches, and an unknown zone with 1 claim averaging $14,209 with an average water depth of 3 inches.
Summary written from NOAA storm reports and NFIP claims for this county. Not a prediction.
17% of Cherokee County’s flood insurance claims were on properties rated outside FEMA’s high-risk zones.
47 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 10 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 2016, with 19 claims and $214,706 paid, the year of Severe Storms and Flooding.
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.
52 NOAA storm reports from Cherokee County describe what happened, in the words of the forecasters who covered it. Read the Texas flood stories →
28 federal disaster declarations since 1987, 7 of them floods, coastal storms or hurricanes.
| Disaster | Began |
|---|---|
| Hurricane Beryl | Jul 5, 2024 |
| Severe Storms, Straight-line Winds, Tornadoes, And Flooding | Apr 26, 2024 |
| Severe Winter Storm | Feb 11, 2021 |
| Severe Winter Storms | Feb 11, 2021 |
| Tropical Storms Marco And Laura | Aug 23, 2020 |
| Severe Storms And Flooding | Apr 17, 2016 |
| Severe Storms, Tornadoes, Straight-line Winds And Flooding | May 4, 2015 |
| Wildfires | Aug 30, 2011 |
Weather and water disasters only; most recent first. Source: OpenFEMA Disaster Declarations.
80 since 1996: 67 flash floods and 11 river or area floods.
| Event | Date | Damage |
|---|---|---|
| Flash Flood | Apr 30, 2025 | — |
| Flash Flood | Jun 12, 2025 | — |
| Flash Flood | May 1, 2025 | — |
| Flash Flood | Jan 24, 2024 | — |
| Tropical Storm | Jul 8, 2024 | — |
| Flash Flood | Jun 2, 2024 | — |
| Flash Flood | Mar 22, 2022 | — |
| Flood | May 5, 2022 | — |
— = no damage estimate in the record. Source: NOAA Storm Events Database.
Flash Flood · Apr 30, 2025. A weak cold front slowly advanced southeast into portions of Northeast Texas, Southeast Oklahoma, into Western Arkansas and Southern Missouri on April 30th, and focused a warm, very moist, and unstable air mass in place across much of East Texas, North Louisiana, and Southwest Arkansas during the afternoon through the evening hours. Meanwhile, an upper low pressure area ejected northeast from the Desert Southwest…
Flash Flood · Jun 12, 2025. An axis of training thunderstorms containing localized 3-4 inch per hour rainfall rates occurred along a well defined cold pool across parts of Central Texas and more isolated into parts of East Texas on the morning of June 12th. These thunderstorms resulted in localized heavy rainfall amounts across parts of Cherokee County. Thunderstorm inflow was characterized by 1500-3000 J/kg of MLCAPE, minimal CIN, 2-2.25 in…
Flash Flood · May 1, 2025. Showers and thunderstorms, some of which contained heavy rainfall, continued from the evening hours on April 30th through the early morning hours of May 1st, along and ahead of a weak cold front that slowly advanced southeast into portions of East Texas and Southern Arkansas. Widespread rainfall amounts of 2-5+ inches fell from April 30th through the early morning hours of May 1st generally along the I-20 corridor…
Flash Flood · Jan 24, 2024. A deep upper-level trough axis became entrenched across the western U.S. early on January 23rd into the 24th, enhancing a deep southwesterly flow pattern across the Middle Red River Valley. Multiple disturbances aloft ejected northeast within the southwesterly flow and combined with a stalled surface frontal boundary to provide a nearly ideal environment for heavy rainfall across the Ark-La-Tex region. The axis of…
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 Cherokee 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.