Flash Flood — Natchitoches, Louisiana

2025-05-06 · near Natchez, Natchitoches, Louisiana

Event narrative

LA 478 near I-49 was covered in high water.

Wider weather episode

An upper level low pressure system over the Desert Southwest shifted east through the Intermountain West on May 6th, inducing surface low development over West Texas. This also resulted in a tightening pressure gradient across the Southern Plains and Lower Mississippi Valley, with increased southerly low level winds allowing for a warm front to shift north to the I-20 corridor of East Texas and North Louisiana before becoming stationary later in the day. A warm, moist, and unstable air mass developed during the 6th south of the front, as large scale forcing increased near and south of the front ahead of the upper trough. As a result, showers and thunderstorms, some of which became severe, developed across East Texas and North Louisiana, producing damaging winds, locally heavy rainfall, and isolated tornadoes. Given the already saturated grounds from heavy rainfall that fell only several days prior, flash flooding was also observed through the afternoon and evening.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (31.6713, -93.1008)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1262138. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.