Phillips, Nebraska
12 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1898 and the latest in 1985. It stands in Precinct 5. It lies in ZIP code area 68865. The Survey maps it on the Phillips quadrangle. 320 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,893 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresPhillips grew from 287 to 320 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 | 287 | |
| 2020 | 320 | +33 (+11%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
6 surveys from 12 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.
- 1898 USGS Grand Island quadrangle1:125000, 4 printings
- 1955 USGS Grand Island quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1957 USGS Grand Island quadrangle1:250000
- 1958 USGS Grand Island quadrangle1:250000
- 1962 USGS Phillips quadrangle1:24000
- 1985 USGS Grand Island quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
Fires near this place
67 since 2004Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 67 fires within 5 miles of Phillips between 2004 and 2020, burning about 588 acres in total. 1 started naturally. None was 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 |
|---|---|
| Debris and open burning | 27 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 15 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 9 |
| Railroad operations and maintenance | 9 |
| Power generation/transmission/distribution | 3 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 2 |
| Fireworks | 1 |
| Natural | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 September 2012 | Recreation and ceremony | 15 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 6 September 2013 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 5.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 2 September 2012 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 40 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 6 August 2012 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 6 August 2005 | Equipment and vehicle use | under an acre | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 18 August 2012 | Debris and open burning | 3.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 10 August 2012 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 25 July 2012 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Storms near this place
38 since 1994Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Phillips in 38 storm reports between 1994 and 2024: 22 hail, 10 thunderstorm wind, 2 tornado, 2 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 2009 | Hail | Phillips | $150,000 | no account filed |
| April 2005 | Hail | Phillips | $100,000 | no account filed |
| June 1997 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | $100,000 | no account filed |
| July 2022 | Hail | Phillips | $50,000 | Quarter to golf ball size hail was reported. |
| July 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | $50,000 | Wind gusts were estimated to be at around 70 MPH based on surrounding observations. Power outages were reported in Phillips. |
| May 2019 | Flood | Phillips | $50,000 | Heavy rainfall resulted in widespread flooding across Hamilton County. Lincoln Creek, the Big Blue and West Fork of the Big Blue were all out of their banks. Numerous rural roads and bridges were under water. |
| June 2008 | Flash Flood | Phillips | $50,000 | Marquette had 7 inches of rain and many other locations across northern Hamilton County saw between 3 and 6 inches of rain that resulted in widespread flash flooding especially along Lincoln Creek and the Big Blue River. |
| May 2008 | Flash Flood | Phillips | $50,000 | Thunderstorms rolled across most of Hamilton County during the evening and nighttime hours and dumped several inches of rain. This caused roads and small creeks to quickly flood. |
| May 2002 | Hail | Phillips | $50,000 | no account filed |
| May 2019 | Hail | Phillips | $25,000 | no account filed |
| April 2013 | Hail | Phillips | $25,000 | no account filed |
| May 2012 | Hail | Phillips | $25,000 | no account filed |
| June 2009 | Hail | Phillips | $10,000 | Wind gusts estimated at 50 to 60 mph were also reported. |
| July 2020 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | - | Wind gusts were estimated to be near 60 MPH. |
| June 2019 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | - | Wind gusts estimated to be near 80 MPH resulted in significant damage to a farm south-southwest of Phillips. Three hog barns and two pole barns were damaged or destroyed. Metal pieces were blown into trees and also spread out about a quarter of a mile. Some tree damage occurred at a nearby residence. An irrigation pivot was also overturned. |
| September 2015 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | - | Wind gusts were estimated to be near 60 MPH. |
| August 2014 | Hail | Phillips | - | This report was received via Facebook. |
| April 2014 | Hail | Phillips | - | Quarter size hail was reported near mile marker 320 on Interstate 80. |
| April 2013 | Hail | Phillips | - | Dime size hail occurred at the intersecton of Highway 34 and Highway 2. |
| May 2011 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | - | Wind gusts were estimated at 60 MPH. |
| June 2009 | Tornado (EF0) | Phillips | - | A brief tornado touched down southwest of Phillips, with no damage reported. |
| July 1995 | Hail | Phillips | - | Severe thunderstorms moved southeast across central Nebraska. Hardest hit were Valley and Sherman Counties where wind gusts to 65 mph and three-quarters inch hail inflicted tree and roof damage. The storms also damaged crops, finishing off some fields which were damaged two days earlier. In Marquette, a man suffered minor injuries when he was struck by lightning as he was closing his garage door. |
| May 1994 | Tornado (F0) | Phillips | - | A small tornado briefly touched down near Phillips. |
| May 2024 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| July 2024 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| July 2023 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| May 2022 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| April 2016 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| April 2016 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| May 2016 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| September 2015 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| September 2013 | Flood | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| July 2009 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| May 2004 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| July 2004 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| April 2001 | Hail | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| August 1999 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | - | no account filed |
| July 1994 | Thunderstorm Wind | Phillips | - | 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.
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 Phillips | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q928106 | 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 832075. 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.
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.





