Hurricanes and Tornadoes That Hit South Miami, FL

The nearest NOAA station with 1991–2020 climate normals is Miami WSO City, FL, 1 mile northeast of South Miami at 15 feet. July is the warmest, with an average high of 89°F and low of 80°F; January is the coolest, at 75°F and 64°F. June is the wettest at 8.7 inches of precipitation on average and March the driest at 2.0 inches; the year adds up to 51.1 inches over 76 days with at least a tenth of an inch. June to November, the hurricane season months, bring 68% of the year's precipitation (34.8 of 51.1 inches); the other six months are drier. October has brought the most of the 84 tropical systems that passed within 75 miles (29); a normal October there has highs of 84°F and 6.0 inches of precipitation. Highs reach 90°F on about 29 days a year, almost all from June to September. A night below freezing comes less than once a year on average. That 51.1 inches is more than at 25 of the 125 Florida stations used on this site (20%). Key Biscayne, 8 miles east, has its own station (Cape Florida, FL): 55.3 inches a year, 4.2 more than here, and a July average high of 91°F against 89°F.

Water temperature at the NOAA tide station Virginia Key, FL, 9 miles east, averaged 89°F in August and 73°F in January over 2021–2025. It averaged 80°F or warmer from May to October. Sea level at the Virginia Key tide gauge, 9 miles from South Miami, 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 269 flood, rain, thunderstorm wind and lightning events that began within 10 miles of South Miami: 151 thunderstorm wind reports, 60 floods, 25 flash floods, 22 lightning strikes and 11 heavy rain events. They killed 1 person and injured 14, and the NWS estimated $3.6 million in property and crop damage. The strongest thunderstorm gust on record here was 90 mph, on January 8, 1998. June has had the most flash floods, 5 of 25. Of the 277 Florida cities on this site with a flash flood on record, 241 have had fewer than South Miami.

Flood insurance policyholders in South Miami's ZIP code 33143 have filed 730 claims with the National Flood Insurance Program since 1979, and were paid $6.6 million for buildings and contents, in the dollars of each year. The most came from Hurricane Andrew in 1992: 173 claims (24% of all) and $1.9 million, then Hurricane Katrina in 2005 with 110 and Hurricane Irene in 1999 with 97. 79% 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, 217 have fewer than South Miami.