Hurricanes and Tornadoes That Hit Fort Lauderdale, FL

The nearest NOAA station with 1991–2020 climate normals is Fort Lauderdale Beach, FL, 3 miles east of Fort Lauderdale at 4 feet. August is the warmest, with an average high of 91°F and low of 77°F; January is the coolest, at 77°F and 60°F. September is the wettest at 9.3 inches of precipitation on average and January the driest at 2.5 inches; the year adds up to 64.4 inches over 85 days with at least a tenth of an inch. June to November, the hurricane season months, bring 66% of the year's precipitation (42.6 of 64.4 inches); the other six months are drier. October has brought the most of the 86 tropical systems that passed within 75 miles (28); a normal October there has highs of 86°F and 7.7 inches of precipitation. Highs reach 90°F on about 70 days a year, almost all from April to October. A night below freezing comes less than once a year on average. That 64.4 inches is more than at 110 of the 125 Florida stations used on this site (88%). Oakland Park, 3 miles northeast, has its own station (Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport, FL): 56.6 inches a year, 7.8 less than here, and the same August average high, 91°F.

Water temperature at the NOAA tide station South Port Everglades, FL, 5 miles southeast, averaged 96°F in August and 82°F in January over 2021–2025. Sea level at the Virginia Key tide gauge, 28 miles from Fort Lauderdale, has risen 1.26 ± 0.04 inches per decade from 1931 to 2025, NOAA's linear trend; at that pace it is 12.6 inches in a hundred years. That is faster than at 76 of the 144 U.S. gauges with a NOAA trend.

Since 1996, the National Weather Service has logged 296 flood, rain, thunderstorm wind and lightning events that began within 10 miles of Fort Lauderdale: 174 thunderstorm wind reports, 58 floods, 35 lightning strikes, 17 flash floods and 12 heavy rain events. They killed 3 people and injured 25, and the NWS estimated $34.2 million in property and crop damage. The strongest thunderstorm gust on record here was 92 mph, on August 25, 1997. October has had the most flash floods, 5 of 17. Of the 277 Florida cities on this site with a flash flood on record, 214 have had fewer than Fort Lauderdale.

Flood insurance policyholders in Fort Lauderdale's 9 ZIP codes have filed 7,496 claims with the National Flood Insurance Program since 1978, and were paid $235.6 million for buildings and contents, in the dollars of each year. The most came from April Florida Flooding in 2023: 2,352 claims (31% of all) and $181.7 million, then Hurricane Irene in 1999 with 695 and Hurricane Wilma in 2005 with 559. 71% of the claims carry the name of a storm or flood event; the rest have no event name. Of the 340 Florida cities on this site with 10 or more claims, 328 have fewer than Fort Lauderdale.