Property Atlas

County hazard profile

Columbia, PA

Pennsylvania · pop. 64,676 · FIPS 42037

Relatively Low
FEMA risk rating · RATING
Winter Weather
dominant hazard
$24M
modeled expected annual loss/yr

Expected annual loss · all 3,232 U.S. counties

among the lowest nationally

national median $15M/yr Columbia $24M

A real dollar distribution: most counties sit far below a handful of high-exposure ones. A FEMA model of annual loss, not a record of disasters.

FEMA national percentile scores

FEMA/CDC score each county 0–100 against all others — the score is the national rank (RATING). Higher risk and vulnerability are worse; higher resilience is better.

FEMA risk indexRelatively Low 62.05/100
national median ~50 near the national middle (62nd percentile)
Social vulnerabilityRelatively Low 29.99/100
national median ~50 lower than most counties (30th percentile)
Community resilienceVery High 88.87/100
national median ~50 higher than 89% of counties

Recorded · NFIP flood claims RECORDED

Realized flood losses in Columbia

The National Flood Insurance Program has paid 2,200 flood-insurance claims totaling $63.2M in Columbia since 1978. The costliest year was 2011 ($39.2M paid).

Flood-insurance dollars paid by year of loss

1978: $9,308 paid 1979: $119,926 paid 1980: $22,305 paid 1981: $40,454 paid 1982: $13,184 paid 1983: $37,640 paid 1984: $11,339 paid 1985: $248 paid 1986: $26,151 paid 1988: $0 paid 1993: $45,141 paid 1994: $0 paid 1996: $1,790,741 paid 1998: $0 paid 1999: $51,531 paid 2000: $2,935 paid 2003: $0 paid 2004: $1,925,152 paid 2005: $306,172 paid 2006: $15,517,769 paid 2008: $5,930 paid 2010: $174,405 paid 2011: $39,206,136 paid 2012: $1,613 paid 2013: $0 paid 2016: $0 paid 2017: $885 paid 2018: $3,758,917 paid 2019: $0 paid 2021: $19,421 paid 2024: $0 paid 2025: $82,009 paid 2011 · $39.2M 1978 2025
$63.2M
total paid
$28,713
average claim
$1.0M
largest single claim
69%
in high-risk flood zones (A/V)

RECORDED — these are actual paid NFIP claims (a redacted census from OpenFEMA), not a model. They are the realized counterpart to the FEMA risk score above: one is what happened and got paid, the other is what a model predicts.

Scope: these are flood-insurance claims, so they undercount flooding where owners were uninsured — read this as "what NFIP paid here," not "every flood." County-level totals, not a per-property or per-address verdict. Verify a specific address and buy coverage at FloodSmart.gov; the underlying data is OpenFEMA NFIP Redacted Claims.

What these figures mean

  • RATING — the FEMA risk score, expected loss, social vulnerability, and resilience are FEMA/CDC models, not records of disasters that happened. The 0–100 scores are already national percentiles.
  • MEASURED — population is a recorded census figure.
  • COMPUTED — the county's rank within the dollar-loss distribution is our placement over the 3,232 counties.
  • CONTEXT — the note below is framing, not a measurement.

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What this is — and is not

This is FEMA/CDC modeled hazard exposure for Columbia, PA and where it ranks among U.S. counties. It is not a verdict on whether Columbia is a good or bad place to live — hazard exposure is not place quality, and a county can't opt out of its geography. It is not a per-property or per-address risk assessment, not a prediction of any specific disaster, and not insurance advice. For site-specific risk use a per-property assessment; for the underlying model see FEMA National Risk Index.