Swan Lake’s biggest natural hazard is avalanches
Most of the natural-hazard damage FEMA expects in Swan Lake comes from avalanches, and overall the risk is very high for a U.S. community.
What stands out about Swan Lake’s weather risks
Read from FEMA’s records below. The page puts what stands out first.
What Swan Lake faces
Each hazard’s share of the damage FEMA expects here, and how it compares with the rest of the country.
Avalanches
Inland flooding
Wildfire
Cold waves
Earthquakes
Does Swan Lake flood? No paid flood claims on record
FEMA’s records show no paid flood insurance claims in Swan Lake. That’s not a promise: most homes don’t carry flood insurance, so small floods go unrecorded.
Swan Lake isn’t in FEMA’s Community Rating System, which cuts flood insurance up to 45% in towns that do extra flood-proofing.
Insurance rates: Lake County.How exposed is Swan Lake?
FEMA expects yearly storm and flood damage to homes and buildings here to be higher than in 84% of U.S. communities, mostly from avalanches and inland flooding.
Rated higher than 444 of the 496 Montana towns we cover.
Swan Lake is smaller than a census tract, so it shares the figures of the tract around its center.
Federal disasters declared here
None of the disasters declared for Lake County shows FEMA aid or repair money reaching Swan Lake itself in FEMA’s records.
Lake County has had 6 natural disasters declared since 1953, most often floods and fires.
Get ready for what Swan Lake actually faces
A short kit for its top hazards, what to check before you buy, and where neighbors get alerts.
- Check the avalanche forecast before heading into the backcountry.
- Carry a beacon, probe and shovel, and know how to use them.
- Most avalanches are set off by the people caught in them.
- Turn around at flooded roads: a foot of moving water can carry off a car.
- Flood insurance usually takes 30 days to start, so buy it before the forecast.
- Keep papers and medicines up high, in a grab-and-go bag.
- Clear dead leaves and brush within 5 feet of the house.
- Sign up for local alerts and know two ways out.
- Keep N95 masks for smoky days.
- Look up the address on FEMA’s flood map.
- Ask the seller or landlord whether it has ever flooded, and what flood insurance costs there.
- Get a flood insurance quote early: policies usually start 30 days after you buy.
Know where neighbors sign up for alerts? Add it to the Handbook so everyone has it.
What these numbers can and can’t tell you
- An average, not a forecast. FEMA’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 there, so a big city isn’t rated riskier just for having more buildings.
- Money that reached town. Flood claims are matched to Swan Lake’s own flood-insurance community; household aid to the registrant’s city; repair grants to Swan Lake.
- It follows property value. FEMA’s model weighs damage to buildings, so a place that recently lost many homes can rate lower than it feels.
Storm stories
Memories, warnings and help from neighbors in Swan Lake.
Your answer becomes a post in Town Square.
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. Preparedness tips: Ready.gov. An average of past damage, not a forecast.