Flood in Neosho County, Kansas

Heavy rainfall from training thunderstorms led to rises along rivers, creeks and streams. Observer measured 7.37 inches of rain in the last 24 hours in Erie; another rainfall report at the Chanute Martin Johnson Airport was 6.71 inches over the same timeframe. This resulted in flooding of multiple roads in the county and moderate flooding along the Neosho River at both Erie and Chanute. Some parts of the levee system broke near the Erie gage site and a few miles upstream. The impacts were flooding in fields, agricultural areas and some streets in Erie.

On Saturday April 27th, there was volatile severe weather across Kansas and Oklahoma. An abundance of moisture and increasing shear through the day resulted in numerous rotating storms which produced several tornadoes across the Flint Hills into southeast Kansas. The strongest tornado was an EF-2 which occurred in Cowley County which did damage to a few outbuildings. Luckily there were no injuries or fatalities reported with these storms. There are 12 confirmed tornadoes from this event with most of them being EF-U or EF-0. These storms did produce hail ranging from quarter to golf ball size and some damaging wind gusts.

Flooding eventually became a major issue as storms trained across southeast Kansas for several hours into the wee hours of the 28th. Between April 25th and April 28th, many locations across southeast Kansas picked up between 7 and 10 inches of rainfall which sent the Neosho, Verdigris and Fall rivers into flood. Five forecast points rose to moderate flood stage. There was damage to several county roads from the flooding with complete washouts, and part of a railroad track in Wilson County was taken out from water eroding the embankment.