Hurricanes and Tornadoes That Hit Harahan, LA

The nearest NOAA station with 1991–2020 climate normals is New Orleans International Airport, LA, 4 miles northwest of Harahan at 4 feet. July is the warmest, with an average high of 91°F and low of 77°F; January is the coolest, at 63°F and 46°F. June is the wettest at 7.6 inches of precipitation on average and October the driest at 3.7 inches; the year adds up to 63.3 inches over 77 days with at least a tenth of an inch. June to November, the hurricane season months, bring 54% of the year's precipitation (34.0 of 63.3 inches); the other six months are drier. September has brought the most of the 78 tropical systems that passed within 75 miles (32); a normal September there has highs of 88°F and 5.1 inches of precipitation. Highs reach 90°F on about 85 days a year, almost all from May to October. Lows fall below freezing on about 5 nights a year. That 63.3 inches is more than at 56 of the 81 Louisiana stations used on this site (69%). Westwego, 3 miles southeast, has its own station (New Orleans Audubon, LA): 64.7 inches a year, 1.4 more than here, and a July average high of 94°F against 91°F.

Water temperature at the NOAA tide station Carrollton, LA, 4 miles east, averaged 88°F in August and 47°F in February over 2021–2025. It averaged 80°F or warmer from June to September. Sea level at the New Canal tide gauge, 8 miles from Harahan, has risen 2.36 ± 0.19 inches per decade from 1982 to 2025, NOAA's linear trend; at that pace it is 23.6 inches in a hundred years. That is faster than at 131 of the 144 U.S. gauges with a NOAA trend.

Since 1996, the National Weather Service has logged 449 flood, rain, thunderstorm wind and lightning events that began within 10 miles of Harahan: 248 flash floods, 183 thunderstorm wind reports, 9 heavy rain events, 5 floods and 4 lightning strikes. They killed 3 people and injured 4, and the NWS estimated $49.7 million in property and crop damage. The strongest thunderstorm gust on record here was 100 mph, on March 29, 2011. Of the 239 Louisiana cities on this site with a flash flood on record, 232 have had fewer than Harahan.

Flood insurance policyholders in Harahan's ZIP code 70123 have filed 7,905 claims with the National Flood Insurance Program since 1978, and were paid $150.0 million for buildings and contents, in the dollars of each year. The most came from Flooding in 1995: 3,907 claims (49% of all) and $89.1 million, then Hurricane Katrina in 2005 with 2,564 and Tropical Storm Isidore in 2002 with 147. The year with the most claims was 2005, with 2,601. 90% of the claims carry the name of a storm or flood event; the rest have no event name. Of the 219 Louisiana cities on this site with 10 or more claims, 206 have fewer than Harahan.