The record
Everything the slot carries, as measured. Series arrays are drawn above and listed here in full.
| Event typeevent_type | Heavy Rain |
|---|---|
| NOAA NCEI event IDncei_event_id | 536,181 |
| Episode IDepisode_id | 88,508 |
| Begin UTCbegin_utc | 2014-08-08T12:00:00+00:00 |
| End UTCend_utc | 2014-08-09T12:00:00+00:00 |
| Statestate | NEBRASKA |
| County/zone typecz_type | C |
| County/zone namecz_name | BUFFALO |
| Latitudelat | 40.730 |
| Longitudelon | -99.010 |
| End latitudeend_lat | 40.730 |
| End longitudeend_lon | -99.010 |
| Deaths directdeaths_direct | 0 |
| Deaths indirectdeaths_indirect | 0 |
| Injuries directinjuries_direct | 0 |
| Injuries indirectinjuries_indirect | 0 |
| Damage propertydamage_property | 0.00K |
| Damage cropsdamage_crops | 0.00K |
| Weather forecast office sourcewfo_source | COOP Observer |
| Episode narrativeepisode_narrative | Although widespread thunderstorm activity affected most all of South Central Nebraska from the evening hours of Friday the 8th into the early morning of Saturday the 9th, there were only a handful of severe-criteria hail and wind reports from western counties including estimated 60 MPH winds in the Minden and Arapahoe areas, quarter size hail in Kearney and hail up to golf ball size in central Dawson County. However, the biggest story of the night turned out to be locally heavy rainfall. While much of the 24-county area received generally 1-2 inches of rain with little to no flooding issues, isolated pockets were drenched with 3-4 in a short time. One of these smaller zones of torrential rain happened to strike the city of Kearney, resulting in one of its worst flash flooding events in several years. Although unofficial reports suggested higher amounts may have fallen in the city, a few of the most reliable gauge readings featured storm totals of 3.89 in the southwestern part of town (NeRAIN observer) and 3.19 at Kearney Regional Airport (NWS cooperative observer). The majority of this rain fell within one hour between 11 pm-12 am CDT, in association with a supercell storm anchoring the western side of a southward-sinking squall line. As a result, significant urban street flooding ensued, stranding at least one to two dozen cars in water up to around 3 feet deep. However, the most newsworthy incident of the night occurred at Good Samaritan Hospital, where water broke through two-story, ground-to-ceiling windows of the cafeteria, allowing water to rush into the building. Flood waters also breached the hospital's basement, and water damage occurred in other portions of the main building. Fortunately, no hospital patients or employees were injured. ||Taking a closer look at the timing and evolution of this event, strong to severe storms initially flared up well-north of the local area near the Nebraska-South Dakota border during the mid-to-late afternoon hours. This area of convection eventually grew upscale into a southeastward-moving squall line which first entered northern portions of South Central Nebraska between 830-1000 pm CDT. Along the western edge of this convective line, a semi-discrete supercell storm organized near the intersection of Dawson-Buffalo-Custer counties around 10 pm CDT. This intense storm then drifted southeastward through much of Buffalo County before weakening over Kearney County, but not before producing the Kearney flash flooding. As this supercell was affecting the Kearney area, a separate and smaller north-south oriented squall line moved into the local area out of southwestern Nebraska, affecting several western counties mainly between 11 pm-1 am CDT and yielding a few reports of marginally severe wind gusts mainly in Furnas and Harlan counties. By around 1 am CDT, both initial convective clusters had weakened enough that it appeared the rest of the night would feature only sub-severe showers and storms. However, during the 3-5 am CDT time frame a pair of isolated severe storms flared up west of the departing larger-scale precipitation shield, likely along an elevated outflow boundary. The southern of these storms reached peak intensity along the Phelps-Harlan county line but yielded no verifying storm reports, while the northern one affected primarily central Dawson County with hail up to golf ball size before dissipating around 530 am CDT. ||This low-end severe weather and isolated flash flooding event was not very synoptically-evident in the hours leading up to it, thanks mainly to the lack of a notable mid-upper level disturbance and surface front. The initial storm development north of the local area appeared tied to a subtle mid level disturbance passing through otherwise typical, late-summer quasi-zonal flow featuring 0-6 kilometer deep layer wind shear generally no more than 30 knots. However, once storms became organized and moved into South Central Nebraska toward sunset they were sustained by respectable most-unstable CAPE on the order of 1000-2000 J/kg, as convective outflow promoted renewed storm development in a moist environment featuring surface dewpoints well into the 60s F. In addition, this nocturnal event was aided by the development of a modest 20-30 knot southwesterly low level jet evident around 850 millibars. |
| Event narrativeevent_narrative | This storm total rainfall was 3.19 inches, and was the 24 hour total, ending the morning of August 9th. This is the official Kearney 24-hour rainfall total from the NWS Cooperative Observer at the airport. |
| Yearyear | 2,014 |
Provenance
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