Arborlook
Risk & Response
by Arborlook Insights

Shelby County, TN

Community risk profile | NRI Score: 73.4 Relatively High

919,173
Population
11
Departments
118
Stations
249
Census Tracts

Natural Hazard Loss Profile

Expected annual loss across the 18 natural hazards in FEMA's National Risk Index. Life safety is expressed in fatality-equivalents, combining expected deaths and injuries. Property loss counts building damage only, separate from agriculture.

Natural Hazard Life Safety
17.5
expected fatality-equivalents per year, natural hazards only
1st highest of 95
Life Safety per 100k
1.90
natural hazard fatality-equivalents per 100,000 residents
28th highest of 95
Natural Hazard Property Loss
$315.4M
expected building loss per year, natural hazards only
1st highest of 95
Property Loss per Resident
$343
natural hazard building loss per resident per year
16th highest of 95

These figures cover natural hazards only. Structure fire, EMS, and motor vehicle incidents are not included in the National Risk Index and are not counted here, so this is not an all-cause life safety measure. For Shelby County, the largest single contributor is Earthquake, 37% of the life-safety total.

Shelby County carries an expected 17 natural hazard fatality-equivalents and $315.4M in building loss per year. Rank chips compare the 95 Tennessee counties. Nationally, Shelby County ranks 17th of 3,222 U.S. counties for life-safety loss, 693rd for life safety per 100k residents, 38th for property loss, and 1553rd for property loss per resident. Computed from census tract data covering every resident, independent of fire department boundaries.

Add fire mortality, cause, and loss

Natural hazard exposure is one half of the picture. The other half is what your departments run on: fire deaths and injuries, cause of ignition, dollar loss per incident. That comes from NERIS incident reporting, and it grows as departments serving Shelby County enroll. Our Regional tier brings it together across your jurisdiction, with participating departments, alongside response time analytics, cross-department benchmarking, and coverage gap analysis.

Talk to us about Shelby County See what a department sees

What Drives the Loss

57%
43%
Property (buildings): $315.4M (56.9%)
Life safety: $239.3M (43.1%)
Agriculture: $52K (0.0%)

Total expected annual loss: $554,679,688 per year. Life safety is shown here in dollars, at FEMA's $13.7M value of statistical life, so the three shares sum to the total.

Hazards Ranked Two Ways

The hazard that threatens people is often not the hazard that destroys buildings. Both columns cover the same 18 hazards over the same year.

By life-safety loss ($/yr)

Earthquake
$89.2M
Cold Wave
$62.2M
Heat Wave
$48.6M
Tornado
$31.5M
Inland Flooding
$5.2M
Lightning
$1.6M

By property loss ($/yr)

Inland Flooding
$148.5M
Earthquake
$126.0M
Tornado
$38.6M
Strong Wind
$774K
Ice Storm
$633K
Hurricane
$329K

Census Tract Risk Map

Shaded by quintile across the census tracts in Shelby County. Gray tracts have no modeled loss or no resident population. Per-resident figures on this map use the National Risk Index 2020 tract population.

Fire Service Profile

45%
36%
18%
Career: 45% (5)
Combination: 36% (4)
Volunteer: 18% (2)
Residents per Station
7,790
census population per registered station
Stations per 100k
12.8
registered stations per 100,000 residents

Department composition covers the 11 departments registered in NERIS Public for Shelby County, TN. Departments that have not registered are not counted. Station coverage divides census population by registered stations; department service areas overlap, so their populations are not summed.

Department Rankings

Fire and EMS departments serving Shelby County. Click column headers to sort.

NRI Rating is from FEMA's National Risk Index, which measures community risk across 18 natural hazards using expected annual losses, social vulnerability, and community resilience. Life-Safety Loss uses FEMA's Value of Statistical Life ($13.7M per expected fatality) to estimate annual risk to human life.

Department boundaries and station counts are self-reported through NERIS Public and may not reflect current service areas. Population and Life-Safety Loss reflect each department's full jurisdiction. County-level risk metrics are computed from census tract data and are not affected by boundary accuracy. See full methodology.

Showing 11 departments
Department Est. Population Life-Safety Loss NRI Rating Stations
Memphis Division Of Fire Services 617,695 $174.3M Relatively High 61
Shelby County Fire Department 141,990 $29.6M Relatively High 14
Collierville Fire & Rescue 51,576 $12.1M Relatively High 7
Bartlett Fire Department 50,137 $9.7M Relatively High 6
Germantown Fire Department 39,894 $9.3M Relatively High 4
Tipton County Fire Department 27,572 $9.0M Very High 3
Millington Fire Department 16,921 $5.6M Relatively High 4
Three Star Volunteer Fire Department 12,431 $4.0M Very High 2
Arlington Fire Department (TN) 20,466 $3.9M Relatively High 4
Fayette County Fire Service 10,281 $3.6M Very High 12
Jericho Fire Department 2,796 $695.3K Relatively Moderate 1
No departments match your search.

Risk Snapshot

17.8%
Poverty Rate
14.8%
Age 65+
12.8%
Disability Rate
12.0%
Uninsured
54.5%
Pre-1980 Housing
1.2%
Mobile Homes
10.3%
Vacancy Rate
0.1%
Wood Heat
$75,427
Median HH Income

FEMA Disaster Declarations

12
Last 10 Years
24
Last 25 Years
Severe Storm
Most Frequent

Response-level intelligence for your region

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