Finney County

Every recorded tornado

1. Injuries and deaths are for the tornado’s whole path, which may extend beyond the county. Deaths recorded within Finney County: 1.
2. Weak tornadoes were under-recorded before Doppler radar coverage became national in the early 1990s, so earlier decades read low. Ratings use the Fujita scale before February 2007 and the Enhanced Fujita scale after.

Storm Prediction Center severe weather database, 1950 to 2025.

Every large fire

1. Large fires mapped by the Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity program since 1984: 1,000 acres or more in the West, 500 or more in the East. Prescribed burns are excluded. Acres here are the part of each perimeter inside this place.

Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (USGS and U.S. Forest Service), 1984 to 2026.

Smoke overhead

1. A smoke day is a date on which a smoke plume traced by NOAA Hazard Mapping System analysts from satellite imagery covered this place's point (the county's population centre or the city centre). Counts here are of medium or heavy smoke. Since 2018 analysts have often drawn light smoke as one area over most of the continent, so light-smoke counts are not comparable from year to year. The plumes show smoke anywhere in the air above, not air quality at the ground, and smoke hidden by cloud is missed.

NOAA Hazard Mapping System smoke analysis, 2011 to 2026, retrieved October 30, 2026.

Claims by ZIP code

This product uses the Federal Emergency Management Agency's OpenFEMA API, but is not endorsed by FEMA. The Federal Government or FEMA cannot vouch for the data or analyses derived from these data after the data have been retrieved from the Agency's website(s).

OpenFEMA NFIP Redacted Claims v3, refreshed August 4, 2026. NOAA Storm Events through 2026.

River crests

River gauges

1. Crests are the highest and the recent crests the National Weather Service lists for each river gauge in the county that has a flood stage, not every flood. Flood categories use each gauge's current flood stages; crests from before levees, dams or channel changes may not be comparable. Crests measured on an old datum are left out of the rankings.

NOAA National Water Prediction Service gauge records, retrieved October 30, 2026.

1. The Palmer Drought Severity Index is computed by NOAA each month from the county's average temperature and precipitation, relative to the county's own climate. Zero is normal; -3 or lower is severe drought and -4 or lower extreme drought. It describes the long-term balance of moisture, not water supply or crop losses.

NOAA NCEI nClimDiv county Palmer Drought Severity Index, 1895 to September 2026, issued October 6, 2026.

1. Earthquakes of magnitude 2.5 or more in the USGS Comprehensive Catalog since 1900. Within 50 miles means the epicentre lies within 50 miles of the county boundary (or inside the county).
2. Small earthquakes were under-recorded before the modern seismic networks of the 1970s and are still missed in remote areas, so early decades read low. Magnitudes are as the catalogue reports them and mix scales (moment, local and body-wave).

USGS ANSS Comprehensive Earthquake Catalog, 1900 to present, retrieved October 30, 2026.

More event types since 1996

Costliest events since 1996

1. Jul 1, 1999Hail$53.0 million
   National Weather Service narrative

   Widespread golfball to softball size hail produced a tremendous amount of damage but miraculously there were no injuries. Almost every house in Garden City sustained damage and all vehicles left in the elements received hail dents or broken windows. Several stories of hail bouncing through rooms were received. The severity of the storm was also unique in that it occurred well after midnight.

2. Aug 20, 2007Thunderstorm Wind$1.5 million
   National Weather Service narrative

   Significant roof damage occurred at the Holcomb High School.

3. Apr 29, 2009Tornado$1.3 million
   National Weather Service narrative

   This tornado started out moving southeast but then curved back to the southwest towards the end of it's life. It unfortunately went through a cattle dairy and killed over 200 head as a tremendous amount of tin churned through the air. There was one male that received injury when a door blew in. There were 8 pivot irrigation sprinklers damaged or destroyed, along with power poles, trees, roof and window damage.

4. Aug 20, 2007Thunderstorm Wind$1.0 million
   National Weather Service narrative

   Major damage was done to the Holcomb power plant. The roof was blown off the boiler house, panels blown off the sides of the building and 9 empty coal cars were blown over.

5. Jun 12, 1997Thunderstorm Wind$1.0 million
   National Weather Service narrative

   Sunflower electric reported damage as greater than 60 knot thunderstorm wind passed through. A six story coal stacker was moved 240 feet! Damage was done to the stacker and coal cars.

6. Mar 4, 2025High Wind, Finney$500,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   ASOS station KGCK Garden City. Measured gusts of 84 mph and sustained speeds of 54 mph. At around the same time, public reports of roofs damaged, a collapsed pergola, overturned semis. The emergency manager also reported downed trees and powerlines. Damage is a rough estimate based on some of the reported damage.

7. Sep 17, 2001Thunderstorm Wind$300,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   A microburst did major roof damage to several houses in the SouthWind country club area. Siding was also taken off several other homes in the neighborhood.

8. Apr 29, 2009Tornado$240,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   This tornado moved quickly into Haskell county at 746 PM (0046Z) but not before damaging three pivot irrigation sprinklers.

9. Apr 29, 2009Tornado$240,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   This tornado broke power poles, roofs on homes, destroyed two mobile homes, disintegrated a shed and destroyed a pivot sprinkler. One female was injured when she was looking out the window and was struck in the face by a piece of wood that crashed into the window.

10. Apr 29, 2009Tornado$225,000
    National Weather Service narrative

    This was a landspout that was occurring west of a bigger tornado that went through a cattle dairy. This landspout damaged 3 pivot irrigation sprinklers as it moved southwest.

1. Storm Events records before 1996 cover only tornadoes, thunderstorm wind and hail. Damage figures are as reported by the National Weather Service at the time, not adjusted for inflation.

NOAA NCEI Storm Events Database, 1950 to 2026, issued October 26, 2026.

All-time high

110°F4 times, most recently Jul 27, 2026

All-time low

−22°FMar 11, 1948

Warmest night

84°FAug 1, 1964

Coldest day

−2°FDec 21, 1983

Wettest day

5.27 inOct 4, 1969

Snowiest day

14.0 inNov 24, 1992

Hottest year

1954mean 57.7°F

Coldest year

1993mean 51.5°F

Wettest year

196930.75 in

Driest year

20225.03 in

Snowiest season

64.5 in1992-93

Station Garden City Regional Airport (USW00023064), 2,878 ft elevation, 8.5 miles from the population centre. Daily records from 1947 to October 26, 2026; 99.3% of days in the last 30 years are complete. Records at a single station can differ from a city’s official threaded record, which may combine several stations.

NOAA NCEI Global Historical Climatology Network Daily.

This product uses the Federal Emergency Management Agency's OpenFEMA API, but is not endorsed by FEMA. The Federal Government or FEMA cannot vouch for the data or analyses derived from these data after the data have been retrieved from the Agency's website(s).

OpenFEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries, retrieved October 30, 2026. Statewide declarations are not listed.

Neighbouring counties

• Tornadoes NOAA Storm Prediction Center severe weather database, through 2025.
• Tropical cyclones NOAA National Hurricane Center HURDAT2 (Atlantic; Northeast and Central Pacific), through 2025.
• Wildfire USGS/USFS Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity, through 2026.
• Storm events NOAA NCEI Storm Events Database, through 2026.
• Flood insurance OpenFEMA NFIP Redacted Claims v3, refreshed August 4, 2026.
• Declarations OpenFEMA Disaster Declarations Summaries v2, retrieved October 30, 2026.
• Weather records NOAA NCEI Global Historical Climatology Network Daily, station USW00023064.
• River crests NOAA National Weather Service, National Water Prediction Service river gauges, retrieved October 30, 2026.
• Drought NOAA NCEI nClimDiv county Palmer Drought Severity Index, through September 2026.
• Smoke NOAA NESDIS Hazard Mapping System smoke analysis, retrieved October 30, 2026.
• Earthquakes USGS ANSS Comprehensive Earthquake Catalog (ComCat), retrieved October 30, 2026.

Joins, thresholds and known limits are set out in the methodology. Found an error? Report it. Page built October 30, 2026.