Lincoln County

Every recorded tornado

1. Injuries and deaths are for the tornado’s whole path, which may extend beyond the county. Deaths recorded within Lincoln County: 0.
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.

Every earthquake of magnitude 4 or more within 50 miles

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.

Volcanoes within 100 miles

1. U.S. volcanoes within 100 miles, from the USGS Volcano Hazards Program. The threat category is the USGS 2018 National Volcanic Threat Assessment, which ranks volcanoes by how hazardous their past eruptions were and how many people and how much infrastructure lie near them. It is not a forecast of eruption.

USGS Volcano Hazards Program, retrieved October 30, 2026.

Mapped landslides

Mapped by NV NBMG (78).

1. Landslides mapped in the USGS compilation of landslide inventories across the United States (version 3.0, 2025), rated probable or better. The compilation joins inventories made by federal and state agencies for different purposes and areas, so the number mapped in a county reflects how closely it has been surveyed as much as how often its slopes fail. An area with few records may simply not have been mapped. Deaths are as recorded in the inventories; a slide listed in two inventories is counted once.

USGS Landslide Inventories across the United States, version 3.0, retrieved October 27, 2026.

More event types since 1996

Costliest events since 1996

1. Jan 11, 2005Flood, Lincoln T Sc$20.0 million
   National Weather Service narrative

   Heavy rains and rapid snow melt caused extensive flooding along the Virgin River and the Muddy Rivers in southern Lincoln and northeast Clark counties. Over 200 homes in the Overton, Mesquite, Caliente, and Littlefield areas were damaged or destroyed by flood waters. Several hundred people were evacuated and spent several nights in shelters and several roads throughout the region were washed away. A train carrying kitchen supplies had also overturned due to the weakening of the dirt beneath the tracks.

2. Nov 30, 2011Strong Wind, Lincoln County Except The Sheep Range$500,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   Strong winds damaged electrical transmission towers and blew down a fence in Lincoln County.

3. Dec 21, 2010Flash Flood$500,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   Flash flooding washed out portions of Highway 317 through Rainbow Canyon, as well as Kane Springs Road.

4. Apr 15, 2002High Wind, Lincoln T Sc$300,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   A strong low pressure system caused considerable damage to portions of Lincoln County. Shingles were blown off many roofs, several empty buildings were blown down, power outages were wide spread, down power lines started many fires across town, and several wind caused rock slides causing people to be stranded were reported. Because of this, the County Commissioner declared a state of emergency and closed the county.

5. Jul 15, 1996Flash Flood$250,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   Persistent strong to severe thunderstorms over the Clover Mountains east of Caliente resulted in high runoff levels which filled a retention basin in the Clover Creek drainage. Consequently, the basin failed and sent water, mud and debris down Caliente's Clover Street flooding homes and businesses and washing at least three cars away. No deaths or injuries occurred.

6. Jul 19, 2018Flash Flood$150,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   There was flash flooding in the Pioche and Panaca areas, including an eight mile stretch of Highway 322 east of Pioche. Highway 93 was starting to wash out near mile marker 113. At Cathedral Gorge State Park, a guardrail was taken out by flood water, and the campground was inundated with four feet of water.

7. Aug 4, 1997Flash Flood$100,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   Heavy rain showers fell on a 9000 acre burn area in northeast Lincoln County and resulted in a flash flood which began in Camp Valley Creek and ended in Eagle Valley Canyon. Flood waters reached as high as 20 feet in places and swept through a ranch damaging property, machinery and hay stacks. The waters also washed out several sections of the road in Eagle Valley Canyon before they were contained in the Eagle Valley Reservoir three miles north of Ursine.

8. Sep 8, 2014Flash Flood$100,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   A mud slide washed out a section of Union Pacific railroad track, derailing a locomotive.

9. Jul 14, 2021Flash Flood$100,000
   National Weather Service narrative

   Major flash flooding along a section of Highway 93 locally known as The Narrows closed the highway from Interstate 15 to Caliente for a day and a half so several feet of dirt could be cleared from the highway.

10. Jul 2, 2014Wildfire, Lincoln County Except The Sheep Range$75,000
    National Weather Service narrative

    The Cottonwood Fire and Middle Ridge Fire were started by lightning near the Utah state line. The fires destroyed two cabins and a trailer home and damaged a cemetery. Beaver Dam State Park was also closed for a time due to the fires.

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°FJul 17, 1998

All-time low

−11°F2 times, most recently Dec 22, 1990

Warmest night

79°FJul 13, 2010

Coldest day

18°FDec 23, 1990

Wettest day

3.00 inMar 11, 2006

Snowiest day

6.0 inNov 28, 2019

Hottest year

2012mean 59.7°F

Coldest year

1990mean 55.4°F

Wettest year

200513.63 in

Driest year

20021.45 in

Snowiest season

10.0 in2008-09

Station Hiko (USC00263671), 3,900 ft elevation, 34.3 miles from the population centre. Daily records from 1989 to October 24, 2026; 94.8% 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 USC00263671.
• 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.
• Volcanoes USGS Volcano Hazards Program, U.S. volcanoes and 2018 threat assessment.
• Landslides USGS Landslide Inventories across the United States, version 3.0 (2025).
• 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.