From http://www.nws.noaa.gov/oh/hic/flood_stats/Flood_loss_time_series.htm Download 3 Nov 1998 [noaa2_trans.gif (753 bytes)] [hic_logo.gif (16143 bytes)] [nwslogo1_trans.gif (4310 bytes)] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Flood Losses Compilation of Flood Loss Statistics The flood loss information provided below can only be considered approximate. There is no one agency in the United States with specific responsibility for collecting and evaluating detailed flood loss information. The National Weather Service (NWS), through its numerous field offices provides loss estimates for significant flooding events. However, this task is ancillary to the prime mission of the NWS which is to provide forecasts and warnings of hydrometeorological events. The Agency's focus is on predicting the events that lead to death and damage, rather than on an assessment of the consequences of the events it predicts. Because of this, the quality of resulting flood loss estimates may be uneven, depending on other operational constraints at a particular field offices. Accurate flood loss estimates would require a concerted effort, based on the availability of substantial resources. There is no central clearinghouse to report flood losses. Our societal infrastructure almost guarantees poor estimates. State and municipal losses are often self-insured. Some portion of the cost to repair a washed out road or bridge might be covered in a budget line item for routine maintenance. Another portion may be financed by a separate line item in the next year's budget. In some cases, a structure may be replaced by one of higher quality, costing more than the replacement value or repair costs of the original structure. Finally, for situations where a governmental entity (city, county, state, etc.) carries no third party insurance, it may decide to forgo some repairs. For homeowners and businesses, some will either not have insurance or be under insured. The costs for this sort of repair is almost impossible to establish. For those that are insured, claims may not fully reflect actual losses. Agricultural losses are also hard to accurately estimate. Loss/damage estimates are reported in many different ways. Totals are may be available on state and county levels. Depending on who is providing them, they may not comprehensively include all damages. In addition, industry-wide estimates (e.g., river transportation/barges, railroads, etc.) covering multiple states are often available. Funding and aid supplied by various agencies of the Federal government may also provide information on losses (e.g., FEMA, Dept. of Agriculture, Small Business Administration, etc.) over a region. Often, there is usually not enough information to easily determine the degree of overlap among these various sources of loss estimates. Flood losses that "fall between the cracks" of the current system could, however, compensate for possible "double counting." Unfortunately, there is usually no easy way to reconcile information form different reporting systems. Finally, deciding what constitutes a loss is not always as simple as it might seem. Certainly the capital cost to repair or replace a bridge that has been washed out is easily identified as a loss. However, if flooding prevents a farmer from planting a crop, what is the value of the loss. The farmer may not have experienced a loss literally, since he did not plant a crop and did not lose the crop but he may have been denied potential income. What if he/she planted later in the season and had reduced yield because of a shorter growing period or because he/she chose to plant a lower-profit crop? How is this loss calculated? In another example, what about the barge operator or the business owner who has to cease operations? In addition to the business owner's repair costs there are his lost income, and the lost income of his employees who may be laid off. In order to make this wide range of economic impacts due to flooding tractable, loss statistics can be partitioned into direct and indirect damages. Direct damages are the costs to repair such things as damaged buildings, washed out railroad beds, bridges, etc. Indirect damages include such categories as lost wages because of business closures. There is no universally agreed upon demarcation between what constitutes a direct and an indirect loss. The above factors only highlight some of the more significant impediments to accurate determination of flood losses. In the case of NWS loss estimates, what is included is the "best estimate" of direct damages due to flooding that results from rainfall and/or snowmelt. It does not include flooding due to winds, such as coastal flooding (e.g., hurricane storm surges). Because of the complexity of the problems and the limited resources available for extensive evaluation of the quality of the data, the estimates provided here should only be considered approximate. In the table below, the data are for water years, starting in October and ending in September. For example, Water Year 1993 starts on October 1, 1992, and ends on September 30, 1993. The quality of the older data is subject to some question. The more recent data are generally more reliable, but while the damage amounts for individual years are not precise, they provide reasonable indications of relative changes over time. The damage figures in the second column are in thousands of dollars. The second column provides "unadjusted" damage amounts. That is, the damage as reported in the year it occurred, not adjusted for inflation. The third column is the number of flood deaths in each year. The column to the right is the Construction Cost Index, used to adjust for inflation. The next column to the right is the adjustment factor applied to the unadjusted estimates to get the column damages estimates "adjusted" to 1997 dollars. Please note that the last column is reported in billions of dollars. The data are also provided in graphical form. Unadjusted Adjusted Year Damages Deaths CCI Adjustment Damages (K) Index Factor (Billion) 1903 $53,116 178 95 61.44 $3.264 1904 $6,545 0 95 61.44 $0.402 1905 $11,000 2 95 61.44 $0.676 1906 $400 1 95 61.44 $0.025 1907 $15,576 7 101 57.79 $0.900 1908 $10,250 11 97 60.18 $0.617 1909 $49,134 5 91 64.14 $3.152 1910 $21,239 0 96 60.80 $1.291 1911 $7,772 0 93 62.76 $0.488 1912 $77,586 2 91 64.14 $4.977 1913 $171,387 527 100 58.37 $10.004 1914 $17,951 180 89 65.58 $1.177 1915 $14,131 49 93 62.76 $0.887 1916 $26,124 118 130 44.90 $1.173 1917 $27,330 80 161 36.25 $0.991 1918 $7,867 0 189 30.88 $0.243 1919 $3,164 2 198 29.48 $0.093 1920 $24,771 42 251 23.25 $0.576 1921 $28,647 143 202 28.90 $0.828 1922 $52,060 215 174 33.55 $1.746 1923 $52,905 42 214 27.28 $1.443 1924 $16,979 27 215 27.15 $0.461 1925 $9,923 36 207 28.20 $0.280 1926 $23,468 16 208 28.06 $0.659 1927 $347,656 423 206 28.33 $9.851 1928 $44,611 15 207 28.20 $1.258 1929 $68,098 89 207 28.20 $1.920 1930 $15,850 14 203 28.75 $0.456 1931 $2,808 0 181 32.25 $0.091 1932 $10,295 11 157 37.18 $0.383 1933 $36,679 33 170 34.34 $1.259 1934 $10,362 88 198 29.48 $0.305 1935 $127,127 236 196 29.78 $3.786 1936 $282,549 142 206 28.33 $8.006 1937 $440,730 142 235 24.84 $10.947 1938 $101,098 180 236 24.73 $2.500 1939 $13,834 83 236 24.73 $0.342 1940 $40,467 60 242 24.12 $0.976 1941 $39,524 47 258 22.62 $0.894 1942 $98,507 68 276 21.15 $2.083 1943 $199,732 107 290 20.13 $4.020 1944 $101,079 33 299 19.52 $1.973 1945 $165,796 91 308 18.95 $3.142 1946 $70,813 28 246 23.73 $1.680 1947 $272,328 55 413 14.13 $3.849 1948 $229,959 82 461 12.66 $2.912 1949 $93,931 48 477 12.24 $1.149 1950 $176,050 93 510 11.45 $2.015 1951 $1,028,741 51 549 10.63 $10.938 1952 $254,064 54 569 10.26 $2.606 1953 $122,204 40 600 9.73 $1.189 1954 $106,842 55 626 9.32 $0.996 1955 $995,491 302 660 8.84 $8.804 1956 $64,688 42 692 8.43 $0.546 1957 $360,303 82 724 8.06 $2.905 1958 $218,255 47 759 7.69 $1.678 1959 $141,255 25 797 7.32 $1.035 1960 $92,976 32 824 7.08 $0.659 1961 $154,033 52 847 6.89 $1.062 1962 $75,237 19 872 6.69 $0.504 1963 $177,946 39 901 6.48 $1.153 1964 $651,642 100 936 6.24 $4.064 1965 $788,046 119 971 6.01 $4.737 1966 $117,004 31 1019 5.73 $0.670 1967 $375,218 34 1074 5.43 $2.039 1968 $339,399 31 1155 5.05 $1.715 1969 $902,654 297 1269 4.60 $4.152 1970 $225,453 135 1381 4.23 $0.953 1971 $287,525 74 1581 3.69 $1.062 1972 $4,465,135 554 1753 3.33 $14.868 1973 $1,894,493 148 1895 3.08 $5.835 1974 $576,203 121 2020 2.89 $1.665 1975 $1,373,269 107 2212 2.64 $3.624 1976 $3,000,000 193 2401 2.43 $7.293 1977 $1,300,000 210 2576 2.27 $2.946 1978 $700,000 143 2776 2.10 $1.472 1979 $3,500,000 121 3003 1.94 $6.803 1980 $1,500,000 82 3237 1.80 $2.705 1981 $1,000,000 84 3535 1.65 $1.651 1982 $2,500,000 155 3825 1.53 $3.815 1983 $4,000,000 200 4066 1.44 $5.742 1984 $3,750,000 125 4146 1.41 $5.279 1985 $500,000 70 4195 1.39 $0.696 1986 $6,000,000 208 4295 1.36 $8.154 1987 $1,444,199 88 4406 1.32 $1.913 1988 $225,298 37 4519 1.29 $0.291 1989 $1,080,814 74 4615 1.26 $1.367 1990 $1,636,431 125 4732 1.23 $2.019 1991 $1,698,781 58 4835 1.21 $2.051 1992 $762,762 87 5004 1.17 $0.890 1993 $16,370,010 109 5162 1.13 $18.511 1994 $1,120,309 70 5320 1.10 $1.229 1995 $5,110,829 103 5471 1.07 $5.453 1996 $6,121,884 131 5596 1.04 $6.386 1997 $8,730,407 98 5837 1.00 $8.730 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Return to the [NWS Hydrologic Services Logo] Hydrologic Last Modified: July 21, Services Program 1998 Home Page