Flood forecasting in semiarid regions is always poor, and a single-criterion assessment provides limited information for decision making. Here, we propose a multicriteria assessment framework (FCRA) to assess the most striking feature of an event-based flood – the peak flow. One hundred flood events are modeled in the middle Yellow River with four hydrological models. Our results show that the FCRA may help decision makers improve their diagnostic abilities in the early flood warning process.