Flood in Colfax County, Nebraska

Heavy rain from roughly June 7th into the 14th produced prolonged flooding along Shell Creek and its tributaries from near Lindsay in Platte county downstream to around Schuyler in Colfax county. The high water flooded many county roads and forced the closure of Highway 15 north of Schuyler for a while. Shell Creek or one of its tributaries also flooded sections of northeast Schuyler prompting homes and businesses to sandbag to try to limit the damage. Nonetheless, some damage to about 200 homes and businesses occurred anyway, mostly to basements. Damage was also noted to county roads and crops because of the prolonged period of high water. Emergency management reported that at one time as many as 40 county roads and 40 bridges were under water in the county. Shell Creek near Columbus crested around 21.6 feet for a prolonged period from late morning on June 12th until early morning on the 13th. Flood stage is 20 feet. The creek near Columbus was above flood stage from the evening of June 11th until the late afternoon hours of June 14th, although flooding probably lasted longer than the 14th downstream of the gauge in Colfax county.

A warm front lifted northeast into eastern Nebraska during the morning hours of June 10th. This brought scattered heavy rain producing thunderstorms to the region. A few of the storms were severe with large hail and damaging winds, but they generally dropped very heavy rainfall which began a 2 week or so period of heavy rain and flooding over much of eastern Nebraska and parts of southwest Iowa. Overall the flooding damage in Nebraska alone in June was estimated to be at least 20 million dollars to public property which didn't include private property or crop damage. The White House declared a federal disaster in 53 Nebraska counties for flooding in June.