Elberta, Alabama
17 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1921 and the latest in 1980. It stands in the Elberta census division. It lies in ZIP code area 36530. The Survey maps it on the Elberta quadrangle. 1,974 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 66 feet above sea level.
On record in Elberta
Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.
On the National Register 1 record
St. Mark's Lutheran Churchlisted 1988
Population over time
2 figuresElberta grew from 1,498 to 1,974 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 1,498 | |
| 2020 | 1,974 | +476 (+32%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
8 surveys from 17 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1921 USGS Bon Secour quadrangle1:62500, 2 printings
- 1941 USGS Foley quadrangle1:62500, 3 printings
- 1943 USGS Foley quadrangle1:62500, 2 printings
- 1957 USGS Pensacola quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1959 USGS Pensacola quadrangle1:250000
- 1960 USGS Pensacola quadrangle1:250000
- 1978 USGS Pensacola quadrangle1:100000, 3 printings
- 1980 USGS Elberta quadrangle1:24000, 2 printings
Fires near this place
123 since 1994Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 123 fires within 5 miles of Elberta between 1994 and 2020, burning about 1,613 acres in total. 3 started naturally. 40 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Arson/incendiarism | 40 |
| Debris and open burning | 39 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 28 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 7 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 5 |
| Natural | 3 |
| Power generation/transmission/distribution | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23 September 2010 | Debris and open burning | 6.0 acres | Alabama Forestry Commission | not named |
| 9 July 2014 | Natural | 200 acres | Florida Forest Service | TARKLIN BAYOU |
| 8 July 1995 | Debris and open burning | 4.0 acres | Alabama Forestry Commission | not named |
| 29 July 2010 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Alabama Forestry Commission | not named |
| 20 July 2000 | Natural | 12 acres | Alabama Forestry Commission | not named |
| 19 July 2002 | Arson/incendiarism | 50 acres | Alabama Forestry Commission | not named |
| 5 June 2006 | Arson/incendiarism | 100 acres | Alabama Forestry Commission | not named |
| 12 June 2002 | Arson/incendiarism | under an acre | Alabama Forestry Commission | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
1 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 1 working within 5 miles of Elberta: 1 prospect. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Aluminum. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Baldwin County Gibbsite Sand | Aluminum | Prospect | 1958 |
Storms near this place
16 since 1996Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Elberta in 16 storm reports between 1996 and 2025: 7 hail, 3 tornado, 2 lightning, 2 thunderstorm wind. The reports record 1 death and 1 injury. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2006 | Lightning | Elberta | 1 killed | An eleven year old boy was struck and killed by lightning while watering his animals near Elberta. Witnesses said there was only one cloud in the sky and the sun was shining when the boy was hit. He was likely hit by the first strike from the storm. He had a water hose in his hand when he was struck. |
| August 2011 | Lightning | Elberta | 1 hurt | no account filed |
| April 2018 | Tornado (EF0) | Elberta | $25,000 | The tornado first touched down near the intersection of County Road 87 and Chatelaine Drive. A few homes experienced shingle damage. Some trees were also uprooted. The|tornado continued moving almost due north, paralleling just east of County Road 87, lifting south of the Dixie Road intersection. Minor tree damage was noted along the path along with isolated instances of very minor structural damage to a few residences. |
| September 2008 | Tornado (EF0) | Elberta | $20,000 | A weak tornado briefly touched down just north of Elberta. The tornado blew down a couple of trees and a trailer home had roof damage. |
| June 2010 | Thunderstorm Wind | Elberta | $12,000 | Strong winds estimated at 60 mph damaged a roof and downed trees and power lines in Elberta. |
| December 2014 | Thunderstorm Wind | Elberta | $1,000 | Strong wind gusts near 50 mph uprooted a magnolia tree, which blocked the intersection of Highway 32 and Highway 83 South. |
| October 2025 | Tornado (EF1) | Elberta | - | The tornado touched down just south of the intersection of Kleinschmidt Road and County Road 87, where minor tree damage was observed. Traveling to the northeast, the tornado crossed County Road 87, uprooting a couple of trees and removing portions of the roof from a small barn. The tornado continued to the northeast before strengthening along Woerner Road South. Here, a large barn lost much of its metal roof paneling, and several trees were uprooted. The tornado appears to have lifted before crossing Woerner Road.||October 29th update: Additional drone video was provided along County Road 87 that revealed the path width being close to 125 yards and an additional patch of trees within a tree stand behind the ground surveyed properties that had several skinny pine trees snapped low bringing the intensity to 95mph.||Special thanks to the Baldwin County EMA for their assistance with this survey.||After review of available high-resolution satellite imagery, the tornado was found to have begun slightly earlier in the forest to the south of Kleinschmidt Road. The tornado was also found to have turned to the east as it crossed Woerner Road South where it did minor tree damage before lifting. |
| January 2017 | Hail | Elberta | - | Off duty NWS employee reported ping pong ball size hail in Elberta. |
| October 2017 | Flash Flood | Elberta | - | Water flowing over the road at the intersetion of CR95 and Woerner Road. |
| August 2016 | Flash Flood | Elberta | - | Water flowing over the road on County Road 87 south of Feely Road. |
| August 2006 | Hail | Elberta | - | Golfball size hail was reported falling from a thunderstorm near Elberta. No damage was reported from the large hail. |
| March 2024 | Hail | Elberta | - | no account filed |
| February 2017 | Hail | Elberta | - | no account filed |
| April 2005 | Hail | Elberta | - | no account filed |
| March 2003 | Hail | Elberta | - | no account filed |
| April 1996 | Hail | Elberta | - | no account filed |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Swift | 3.0 miles | 17 | |
| Miflin | 3.1 miles | 19 | |
| Blue Grass Recreational Vehicle Park | 3.3 miles | 17 | |
| Foley | 4.6 miles | 17 | |
| Foley Recreational Vehicle Park | 5.7 miles | 17 | |
| Josephine | 7.0 miles | 19 | |
| Perdido Beach | 7.1 miles | 19 | |
| Summerdale | 7.4 miles | 17 |
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Elberta | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q68218 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 117910. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.







