Hurricanes and Tornadoes That Hit Wesley Chapel, FL

The nearest NOAA station with 1991–2020 climate normals is Saint Leo, FL, 8 miles northeast of Wesley Chapel at 190 feet. August is the warmest, with an average high of 90°F and low of 73°F; January is the coolest, at 70°F and 49°F. June and August are the wettest at 8.3 inches of precipitation on average and November the driest at 1.9 inches; the year adds up to 53.6 inches over 77 days with at least a tenth of an inch. June to November, the hurricane season months, bring 68% of the year's precipitation (36.3 of 53.6 inches); the other six months are drier. September has brought the most of the 70 tropical systems that passed within 75 miles (25); a normal September there has highs of 88°F and 6.6 inches of precipitation. Highs reach 90°F on about 114 days a year, almost all from April to October. Lows fall below freezing on about 3 nights a year. That 53.6 inches is more than at 56 of the 125 Florida stations used on this site (45%). Thonotosassa, 11 miles south, has its own station (Plant City, FL): 56.2 inches a year, 2.6 more than here, and an August average high of 94°F against 90°F.

Water temperature at the NOAA tide station East Bay, FL, 23 miles south, averaged 89°F in July and 64°F in January over 2021–2025. It averaged 80°F or warmer from May to October. Sea level at the East Bay tide gauge, 23 miles from Wesley Chapel, has risen 2.17 ± 0.16 inches per decade from 1976 to 2025, NOAA's linear trend; at that pace it is 21.7 inches in a hundred years. That is faster than at 125 of the 144 U.S. gauges with a NOAA trend.

Since 1996, the National Weather Service has logged 69 flood, rain, thunderstorm wind and lightning events that began within 10 miles of Wesley Chapel: 63 thunderstorm wind reports, 4 lightning strikes and 2 heavy rain events. They killed 0 people and injured 1, and the NWS estimated $1.3 million in property and crop damage. The strongest thunderstorm gust on record here was 69 mph, on January 9, 1997.

Flood insurance policyholders in Wesley Chapel's 3 ZIP codes have filed 243 claims with the National Flood Insurance Program since 1979, and were paid $5.0 million for buildings and contents, in the dollars of each year. The most came from Hurricane Milton in 2024: 89 claims (37% of all) and $4.0 million, then Hurricane Frances in 2004 with 37 and Hurricane Irma in 2017 with 19. 76% 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, 161 have fewer than Wesley Chapel.