Hurricanes and Tornadoes That Hit Vega Baja, PR

The nearest NOAA station with 1991–2020 climate normals is Palmarejo Vega Baja, PR RQ, 5 miles southwest of Vega Baja at 560 feet. August is the warmest, with an average high of 88°F and low of 73°F; January is the coolest, at 82°F and 66°F. September is the wettest at 7.3 inches of precipitation on average and February the driest at 3.3 inches; the year adds up to 64.5 inches over 124 days with at least a tenth of an inch. June to November, the hurricane season months, bring 55% of the year's precipitation (35.4 of 64.5 inches); the other six months are drier. September has brought the most of the 63 tropical systems that passed within 75 miles (29); a normal September there has highs of 88°F and 7.3 inches of precipitation. Highs reach 90°F on about 47 days a year, almost all from April to October. A night below freezing comes less than once a year on average. That 64.5 inches is more than at 11 of the 21 Puerto Rico stations used on this site (52%). Vega Alta, 4 miles east, has its own station (Dorado 2 WNW, PR RQ): 66.0 inches a year, 1.5 more than here, and the same August average high, 88°F.

Water temperature at the NOAA tide station San Juan, La Puntilla, San Juan Bay, PR, 18 miles east, averaged 86°F in September and 80°F in February over 2021–2025. Sea level at the San Juan tide gauge, 18 miles from Vega Baja, has risen 0.85 ± 0.06 inches per decade from 1962 to 2025, NOAA's linear trend; at that pace it is 8.5 inches in a hundred years. That is faster than at 45 of the 144 U.S. gauges with a NOAA trend.

Since 1996, the National Weather Service has logged 354 flood, rain, thunderstorm wind and lightning events that began within 10 miles of Vega Baja: 176 flash floods, 115 floods, 40 heavy rain events, 21 thunderstorm wind reports and 2 lightning strikes. They killed 3 people and injured 1, and the NWS estimated $1.50 billion in property and crop damage. The strongest thunderstorm gust on record here was 58 mph, on June 22, 2015. May has had the most flash floods, 43 of 176. Of the 86 Puerto Rico cities on this site with a flash flood on record, 62 have had fewer than Vega Baja.

Flood insurance policyholders in Vega Baja's 2 ZIP codes have filed 1,749 claims with the National Flood Insurance Program since 1978, and were paid $7.6 million for buildings and contents, in the dollars of each year. The most came from Flooding in 1987: 910 claims (52% of all) and $4.8 million, then Hurricane Isabel in 1985 with 184 and Hurricanes David & Frederic in 1979 with 102. The year with the most claims was 1985, with 377. 76% of the claims carry the name of a storm or flood event; the rest have no event name. Of the 72 Puerto Rico cities on this site with 10 or more claims, 69 have fewer than Vega Baja.