Corridor Roof Report · Storm Record
Hail gets the attention and wind does the damage. In the federal storm record for Kentucky in 2025, wind events outnumbered hail events 740 to 262 — about 2.8 to 1 — and in Madison County the split was 12 wind events to 3 hail. If you are checking a roof after a storm, wind is statistically the more likely culprit, and it does not leave the marks people are looking for.
Does wind or hail cause more storm events in Kentucky?
Wind, by a wide margin. NOAA’s Storm Events Database logged 740 wind-type events across Kentucky in 2025 against 262 hail events — roughly 2.8 wind events for every hail event.
Broken out, that is 677 thunderstorm wind events plus 61 strong-wind events and the remainder high wind. Recorded wind magnitudes ran from 35 knots (about 40 mph) at the low end to 83 knots (about 96 mph) at the high end, with a median of 50 knots — roughly 58 mph. Recorded hail ran to a maximum of 4.50 inches, with a median of 1.00 inch, which is the classic quarter-sized stone.
Here is how 2025 fell across the counties we work in. Read it with the caveat in the next section firmly in mind.
| County | Wind events | Hail events | Tornado |
|---|---|---|---|
| Madison | 12 | 3 | 0 |
| Estill | 11 | 1 | 0 |
| Wolfe | 9 | 2 | 0 |
| Garrard | 9 | 1 | 1 |
| Powell | 8 | 0 | 0 |
| Montgomery | 7 | 0 | 0 |
| Fayette | 6 | 2 | 0 |
| Scott | 5 | 1 | 0 |
| Lee | 4 | 0 | 0 |
| Bourbon | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Clark | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Woodford | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Jessamine | 0 | 0 | 1 |
Why does Fayette County show fewer events than Madison or Estill?
Because this is a record of reported events, not of weather. A storm only enters the database when someone observes and reports it, so county counts mix real storm frequency with reporting density.
This is the single most important caveat on the table above, and I would rather lead with it than bury it. Fayette County showing 6 wind events while Estill County showed 11 does not establish that Estill is windier. Rural counties with spotter networks and open terrain sometimes generate more reports than a dense urban county where the same gust passes between buildings unremarked, and the reverse happens too. The honest reading is: wind events are recorded across every county we serve, in the high single digits to low teens per year, and the wind-to-hail ratio is lopsided everywhere. Do not read a league table into it.
What the counts are genuinely good for is calibrating expectations. A homeowner who has lived in Madison County for ten years has probably sat through something in the order of a hundred recorded wind events and a couple of dozen hail events. That is the exposure history the roof above them actually has.
Hail damage announces itself. Wind damage hides, because the shingle that lifted usually lies back down flat.
What does wind damage look like compared with hail?
Hail bruises the field of the shingle in a random scatter. Wind works the edges and the seal strip, so the damage follows lines — rakes, ridges, eaves and the windward slope.
The practical difference, and the reason wind claims get missed, is that the two failures present completely differently:
- Hail leaves impact marks distributed across the slope with no particular regard for geometry, often with matching marks on soft metal — vents, gutters, flashing, the top of an air conditioner. That collateral evidence on metal is what makes a hail event easy to confirm from the ground.
- Wind breaks the adhesive seal between shingle courses. Once the seal is broken, the shingle is loose whether or not it looks it, because it falls back into position when the wind drops. The marks to look for are along edges and transitions: lifted or missing tabs at the rake and eave, creased shingles, exposed nail heads, displaced ridge cap, and damage concentrated on one slope rather than scattered over all of them.
- Both can leave a roof that looks entirely normal from the driveway. Neither diagnosis should be made from a photograph taken from the ground, and I would not make one from one.
The craft point I would pass on to any homeowner is about sequencing, not technique. After a wind event the useful question is not “is anything missing” — missing shingles are the easy case and you can usually see them. The useful question is “is anything still sealed.” A roof can lose none of its shingles and most of its wind resistance in the same storm, and the next ordinary gust is the one that takes them off. That is why we treat a recorded wind event as a reason to look, not a reason to wait for a leak. A leak is the late symptom; a broken seal is the early one. The same logic drives the checklist in what to do after the storm, and wind damage roof repair covers what the repair itself involves.
What I will not put a number on is cost. Material prices and crew availability in Central Kentucky move, and a figure invented here would be worse than none. Any real number comes from looking at the specific roof.
Which month has the most wind events in Kentucky?
In 2025 the record was heavily concentrated in spring: 289 wind events in May, 142 in March and 125 in April. The one figure that surprises people is December, with 32 — more than June’s 92 would suggest for a winter month, and well above February’s 6. Winter wind is not a small category in Kentucky.
Does a recorded event in my county mean my roof was damaged?
No. A county-level event means a report came from somewhere in the county, which can be many miles from any given address. It is a reason to have a look, not evidence of damage at a specific property, and it is not a basis for an insurance claim on its own.
Is 58 mph enough to damage shingles?
The median recorded magnitude in 2025 was 50 knots, about 58 mph, which is squarely in the range where seal-strip failure and tab lifting occur on asphalt shingles — particularly on older roofs where the adhesive has aged, at edges and corners where uplift concentrates, and where the original installation was short on nails or had them placed high. Whether a specific roof was affected depends on its age, its condition and its exposure, which is an inspection question rather than a wind-speed question.
Source: NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, Kentucky records for calendar year 2025, from the detail file released August 19, 2026 and read October 17, 2026.
Last updated: October 17, 2026.
Disclosure: Central Roof Repair is owned by Marcos Gil, who also owns Central Property Services and publishes marcosgilrealty.com and investinthegorge.com. By Marcos Gil, REALTOR® — Keller Williams Commonwealth · KY Real Estate License No. 296259 · Call or text (859) 310-1209.
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