Flash Flood — Bayfield, Wisconsin

2018-06-17 · near Ino, Bayfield, Wisconsin

$2.2M

Property damage

Event narrative

US Highway 2 was washed out at North Fish Creek west of Tomich Road east of Ino. The culvert failed and eroded the road on both sides.

Wider weather episode

Multiple rounds of thunderstorms along a stationary boundary starting Friday, June 15th, and persisting through the day June 16th, acted to saturate soils across northwest Wisconsin. Another round of training storms developed the night of the 16th, fed by a moist low-level jet. Training storms and slow storm motion led to heavy rainfall across Douglas, Bayfield, Ashland and Iron counties. Three day rainfall amounts of 6-10 inches were common through these counties with a vast majority of it falling during the night of the 16th into the 17th. Areas of central Bayfield county saw in excess of 15 inches or rainfall during this event. This led to historic flooding focused in the Drummond, Grand View and Benoit areas of Bayfield County, along with the Foxboro, Chaffey and Dairyland areas of western Douglas County. The KDLH radar failed during the evening of June 16th and frequent lighting prevented the restoration of service until after daybreak on the 17th, resulting in the main radar covering this event not being available. One man was killed after his vehicle left the road and went into a ditch filled with 6-8 feet of water near the Bad River south of Ashland. Additionally, one or more microbursts were reported in central Sawyer County near Grindstone Lake resulting in tree damage and damage to homes. One man was killed when a tree fell on his camper near the town of Edgewater. The runoff from the storms continued to cause problems into the new week as it led to significant rises on area rivers and additional flooding. Damages estimates of $95,706 for Ashland County, $3,988,546 for Bayfield County, $66,180 for Burnett County, $3,875,140 for Douglas County, and $701,922 for Iron County, totaling $8,727,494. The DNR reported damage totaling $4,212,077 in the region, resulting in a total of $12,939,615 in damages in northwest Wisconsin from this event.

View location on OpenStreetMap → (46.5297, -91.1501)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 765588. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.