Storm Events Database

Storm Events Database

Event Details

Event Hail
Magnitude 1.00 in.
State NEBRASKA
County/Area HOWARD
WFO GID
Begin Date 10/07/2011 18:00:00 CST-6
Begin Range 0
Begin Azimuth N
Begin Location DANNEBROG
Begin Lat/Lon 41.12/-98.55
End Date 10/07/2011 18:00:00 CST-6
Deaths Direct/Indirect 0/0 (fatality details below, when available...)
Injuries Direct/Indirect 0/0
Property Damage 0.00K
Crop Damage 0.00K
Episode Narrative Ending a stretch of 2.5 weeks of bone-dry weather, and also ending a streak of nearly six weeks with no severe thunderstorms in the 24-county area, this Friday afternoon and evening featured a concentrated corridor of strong to severe storms and heavy rainfall mainly across western portions of South Central Nebraska. These storms forced delays or cancellations to a number of high school football games during what turned into a fairly prolonged event, with wind and hail-producing storms first flaring up around 230 PM CDT, and finally diminishing in intensity around 1 AM. The majority of severe storms and heavy rainfall regenerated for several hours within a narrow southwest-northeast oriented corridor only about 30 miles wide at most, primarily impacting counties such as Furnas, Harlan, Phelps, Buffalo, Howard, Hall and northwest Adams. The storm mode was a mixed bag of quasi-discrete, fast moving supercells and small multicell bowing segments. Storm reports included several instances of damaging wind gusts and hail up to the size of golf balls. A few of the more notable reports were from Atlanta in Phelps County, including golf ball size hail and significant wind damage to the roof of a grain storage building. At the Holdrege airport, two separate storms produced measured gusts to around 60 MPH, several hours apart from one another. Although a few storms exhibited low-level rotation, no tornadoes occurred.

Heavy rainfall-wise, parts of primarily eastern Furnas, northwest Harlan, Phelps, Buffalo and southeast Sherman Counties measured 3-6 inches of rain during this event, including 5.94 inches northwest of Oxford and 5.33 inches in Loomis. Kearney Regional Airport established a record for the date with 2.29 inches. Although the heaviest rain associated with this low pressure system fell during these storms on the afternoon and evening of the 7th, additional rain throughout the weekend boosted 3-day totals into the 6-7 inch range for some areas, highlighted by 7.13 inches at Loomis. Fortunately, due to the very dry conditions leading up to this event, widespread flooding impacts were held to a minimum.

On the synoptic scale, the primary trigger for severe weather was the approach of a highly amplified mid-level trough across the western United States, anchored by a closed low swinging through the Four Corners region. Downstream from this low, a corridor of strong, nearly unidirectional south-southwest winds was in place in the mid and upper levels. At the surface, storm development focused along a quasi-stationary front, which at mid-afternoon stretched from eastern South Dakota to southwest Kansas. Given that winds aloft were largely parallel to this southwest-northeast oriented surface front, convection was able to focus within the aforementioned narrow corridor, with individual storms within the corridor racing northeast. Mesoscale parameters at early evening revealed only modest instability, with mixed-layer CAPE values only around 1000 J/kg, but in the presence of very strong deep-layer vertical wind shear of 50-60 knots. Although low-level shear ramped up as the evening progressed, with 0-1 kilometer shear values increasing to 30-40 knots, the combination of increasing low level convective inhibition and multiple storm mergers likely helped mitigate a potential tornadic threat.
Event Narrative


All events for this episode:

Location County/Zone St. Date Time T.Z. Type Mag Dth Inj PrD CrD
Totals: 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
HOLDREGE PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
KEARNEY BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
BERTRAND PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
EDISON FURNAS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
KEARNEY BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
OXFORD FURNAS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
ROCKVILLE SHERMAN CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
BEAVER CITY FURNAS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
FUNK PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
BEAVER CITY FURNAS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
BEAVER CITY FURNAS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
LOOMIS PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
OXFORD FURNAS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
OXFORD FURNAS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
RAVENNA BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
ORLEANS HARLAN CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
FUNK PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
ORLEANS HARLAN CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
RAVENNA BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
ELM CREEK BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
HILDRETH FRANKLIN CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
RAVENNA BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 06:00 CST-6 Heavy Rain 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
PROSSER ADAMS CO. NE 10/07/2011 14:25 CST-6 Hail 1.00 in. 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
GRAND IS HALL CO. NE 10/07/2011 14:55 CST-6 Hail 0.75 in. 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
ATLANTA PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 15:40 CST-6 Thunderstorm Wind 52 kts. EG 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
KEARNEY BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 16:35 CST-6 Hail 1.00 in. 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
(EAR)KEARNEY ARPT BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 16:43 CST-6 Thunderstorm Wind 51 kts. MG 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
GIBBON BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 16:50 CST-6 Hail 0.88 in. 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
CAIRO HALL CO. NE 10/07/2011 17:13 CST-6 Hail 0.75 in. 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
DANNEBROG HOWARD CO. NE 10/07/2011 18:00 CST-6 Hail 1.00 in. 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
ATLANTA PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 18:30 CST-6 Hail 1.75 in. 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
BREWSTER ARPT PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 18:45 CST-6 Thunderstorm Wind 50 kts. MG 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
RAVENNA BUFFALO CO. NE 10/07/2011 20:50 CST-6 Thunderstorm Wind 52 kts. EG 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
BREWSTER ARPT PHELPS CO. NE 10/07/2011 23:15 CST-6 Thunderstorm Wind 55 kts. MG 0 0 0.00K 0.00K
Totals: 0 0 0.00K 0.00K