Heavy Rain — Appanoose, Iowa

2025-08-07 · near Sharon, Appanoose, Iowa

Event narrative

Highway 2 closed 5 miles east of Centerville near mile markers 178 and 179 due to water over the road. This is a known local trouble spot that typical ponds to 6 to 8 inches on the roadway.

Wider weather episode

Iowa was on the edge of a deep thermal ridge. Several weak embedded waves moved across, aiding in thunderstorms development as the interacted with the low level jet through the early morning. These early morning storms did remain sub severe, but produced heavy rain that continued through midday. Training storms across southern Iowa result in an area of five to seven plus inches of rain, but no flash flooding occurred there. Three plus inches of rain occurred in parts of Clarke, Decatur, and Wayne counties with culverts and secondary roads washed out in flash flooding. A single storm in southern Iowa strengthened as it was preparing to cross the border into Missouri. While it did not produce widespread severe damage, it did produce a microburst over the small town of Lineville, IA. A review of damage photos and drone footage provided by the Emergency Manager are consistent with straight line or microburst winds estimated of up to 90 mph. The damage footprint impacted outbuildings on the north end of Lineville and grain bins in south Lineville (a roughly 1 mile swath); as well as damage to trees and destruction of the fire station damage in between. The damage pattern in-town and in cornfields upstream did not reveal a focused track; instead a more erratic and fanning out pattern typical of severe straight line winds.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (40.7400, -92.7200)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1294461. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.