What is the 100-year flood plain?
The 100-year flood plain, or Special Flood Hazard Area, is an area of land that has been determined by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) as having a 1% chance of flooding in any given year. The flood plain is composed of a flood way and a flood fringe.The flood way is typically determined to be the channel of a river or stream and the overbank areas adjacent to the channel.The flood fringe is the area to either side of the flood way that is subject to flooding, but conveys little or no flow.
Areas shown as a Special Flood Hazard Area (SFHA) on the Flood Insurance Rate Map (FIRM) published by The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for a particular community. These areas are darkly shaded on the FIRM. Property which lies in a SFHA has a 1 percent chance of being flooded in any given year. It is important to remember that this does not mean that the property will only flood once ever 100 years but that the area that has a 1 in 100 chance of being flooded in any year. According to FEMA, over the 30-year life of a typical mortgage, there is at least a 26 percent chance that property in a SFHA will be flooded.
