Natural hazards · Sleeping Buffalo

Sleeping Buffalo, MT natural hazards

Most of the natural-hazard damage FEMA expects in Sleeping Buffalo comes from cold waves, and overall the risk is low for a U.S. community.

FEMA National Risk Index, December 2025 · OpenFEMA claims, aid & declarations

Expected damage

How exposed is Sleeping Buffalo?

Low

vs. U.S. communities

FEMA expects yearly storm and flood damage to homes and buildings in Sleeping Buffalo to be higher than in 37% of U.S. communities, mostly from cold waves and inland flooding.

Cold waves48%Inland flooding44%Everything else9%

By hazard

What Sleeping Buffalo faces

Each hazard’s share of the damage FEMA expects here, and how that compares with the rest of the country.

Cold waves

48% of expected damage

Well above average · among the top 1% of U.S. places

Recorded about 14 times a year in the area

Inland flooding

44% of expected damage

Above average · higher than 64% of U.S. places

Recorded about 2 times a year in the area

Lower here

TornadoesHailIce stormsWinter weatherHeat wavesWildfireEarthquakesLandslidesStrong windLightningDroughtAvalanches

Not a risk here

Coastal floodingHurricanesTsunamisVolcanic activity

Flood risk changes street by street. Check a specific address on FEMA’s flood map, and ask about flood insurance before you buy.

Flood insurance claims

Does Sleeping Buffalo flood?

FEMA's records show no paid flood insurance claims in Sleeping Buffalo.

of all homes
are insured

No community discount. Sleeping Buffalo isn’t in FEMA’s Community Rating System, which cuts flood insurance up to 45% in towns that do extra flood-proofing.

Insurance rates: Phillips County.

Disasters that hit Sleeping Buffalo

Federal disasters declared here

None of the disasters declared for Phillips County shows FEMA aid or repair money reaching Sleeping Buffalo itself in FEMA’s records.

Brought FEMA money into Sleeping BuffaloDeclared for Phillips County only

Phillips County has had 8 natural disasters declared since 1953, most often severe storms and floods.

About these numbers

How to read this page

An average, not a forecastFEMA’s National Risk Index estimates the damage 18 kinds of natural hazards cause in a typical year, from decades of records and models. A quiet decade can follow a bad year.

Compared by rate“Higher than N%” compares yearly damage as a share of what’s here, so a big city isn’t rated riskier just for having more buildings. Sleeping Buffalo is smaller than a census tract, so it shares the figures of the tract around its center.

Money that reached townFlood claims are matched to Sleeping Buffalo’s own flood-insurance community; household aid to the registrant’s city; repair grants to Sleeping Buffalo. FEMA’s model follows property values, so a place that recently lost many homes can rate lower than it feels.

Sources: FEMA National Risk Index (December 2025); OpenFEMA: NFIP redacted claims, multiple-loss properties, community status book and residential penetration rates, housing assistance (owners and renters), public assistance funded projects, hazard mitigation properties and disaster declarations. Census tracts: U.S. Census Bureau.