Thunderheads Northeast of Rochester May 2nd 2012

Goodhue/Wabasha County storms.

Severe thunderstorms impacted the area today. Thunderstorms formed along a boundary that sat right over the area during the afternoon along and north of highway 14. These storms developed just west of the area and moved over and quickly became severe. Several cells were seen and most of them produced very large hail, torrential rain  and severe wind damage. These storms tracked right down the state road 60 corridor and impacted the Kenyon, Zumbrota and Wabasha areas with significant hail and wind. One of the worst reports of damage I saw was trees reported down from high winds across the city of Wabasha along with golf ball sized hail. This hail caused sigificant damage to trees and shrubs with newly emerging leaves. The local news reports that the hail was so severe in some cases that it piled up so deep snowplows had to be used in removing the hail, see KTTC for more on their story covering the storms. Flooding rains may also have been a problem in some areas as radar indicated over 2.50″ rain could have fallen across Central Goodhue and Wabasha counties. A list of reported can be found below.

Fillmore county storm

Storms re developed in Iowa overnight an tracked northeast across Fillmore county this morning, high wind gusts downing trees was the main severe weathe threat from these storms. A report of trees down came in from Harmony and a report of a large pine tree down was reported south of Rushford with this storm Reports from this storm can be found below.

 Photo taken Wednesday afternoon May 3rd 2012

A warm summer-like day also took place across the area before storms broke out. High tempetures were in the upper 70s to mid 80s in some areas, which is about 10 degrees above normal. Dewpoints were sticky rainging from from 60 to as high as 66.F. These are the warmest tempetures of the season so far!

Highest tempetuires reported Wednesday

The highest temp was seen at inner city stations in Rochester, which hit 85.F, cooler stations were in the wooded southeastern areas near the Missippi River.

Storm Reports Wabasha/Goodhue Counties

4 miles S Wanamingo 1.75″ Golf ball sized hail

3 miles E Bellechester 1.75″ Gold ball sized hail

Kellogg 64MPH wind gust

Wabasha Trees down across the city

5 miles SW Lake City 1.75″ Golf ball sized hail, lots of hail. hail piled up 1-3 feet in some places
Wabasha 1.75″ Golf ball sized hail, along with estimated 50MPH winds

2 miles W Oak Center 1.50″ hail

6 miles S Wanamingo 1.00″ Quater sized hail

3 miles W Zumbrota 1.00″ Quater sized hail

2 miles NW Bear Valley 1.00″ Quater sized hail

5 miles S Lake City 1.00″ Quater sized hail

Fillmore County Storm

Harmony Trees down in town with estimated 70MPH gusts.

3 miles S Rushford, Large pine tree down across state road 43.