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Louisiana FloodMaps Portal

Patricia Skinner  |  5/2/2018 2:19:51 PM


The Base Flood – on the map

View FEMA’s Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs) over road maps and aerial photos; get zone, Base Flood Elevation, and contact information for local floodplain officials.

Go to the Maps

Get the Guide to Using FloodMaps


The Base Flood – on the ground

Learn how you know what’s In or Out, what it means for construction and financing, how to get the map amended and how to get the best rate on flood insurance.

Get "Mapped OUT of 'the Flood Zone'"

Get "Mapped IN 'the Flood Zone'"


The Base Flood – at your house

Use the Scenarios Guide and Scenarios Tool to see what the Base Flood would look like with your ground and base flood elevations and with your foundation style.

Get the Scenarios Guide

Go to the Scenarios Tool

Go to Flood Maps FloodSmart in LA

NEW vs Old Zone Activities for Kids

Please report any issues or concerns to FloodMaps@agcenter.lsu.edu.


The legend on this state index distinguishes parishes by one of two criteria:

  • age and format of their Effective Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs). In parishes shown green, some or all of the parish is using a map that was produced before 2003 and given to the community as a paper map. Parishes shown in blue are using newer, digital FIRMs, for all communities in the parish.
  • whether the FIRM being used by insurance and real estate agents and mortgage lenders is being updated. In these parishes (striped) new flood risk information is provided as a Preliminary or Future FIRM. These maps will be used for insurance and lending industries once they become Effective FIRMs.

Flood maps on this site are displayed over Bing maps. The LSU AgCenter FloodMaps system is unique in that it integrates flood risk information with ground elevation data (provided by a service of the US Geological Survey) and basic wind speed (derived from the 2003 International Residential Code (IRC) and produced as a service by the LSU AgCenter). (Basic Wind Speed Interactive Map service is temporarily suspended pending acquisition of map for the code adopted by Louisiana effective February 1, 2018).

Effective February 1, 2018, Louisiana adopted the 2015 IRC (with amendments), replacing the 2012 IRC Basic Wind Speed map with the 2015 IRC Ultimate Design Wind Speed (UDWS) map as the wind-speed design criteria for one-to-four family dwellings. The threshold at which site-specific wind design is required is UDWS = 130 mph.

Previously, as of January 1, 2013, Louisiana had adopted the 2012 IRC and replaced the 2003 IRC Basic Wind Speed map with the 2012 IRC Basic Wind Speed map. Even though the 2006 IRC lowered the threshold to 100 mph for leaving the basic code and requiring site-specific wind engineering (or use of accepted high-wind engineering guides), Louisiana still retained 110 mph as that threshold.

Official Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs) can be found for all parishes at the FEMA Map Service Center (MSC) web site. FEMA's MSC Web site is the official source of FIRMettes that can be used for flood insurance and floodplain management purposes.
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