Winter Storm — Beadle, South Dakota

2019-11-28 to 2019-11-30 · Beadle, South Dakota

Direct deaths

Injuries

Event narrative

Mixed precipitation, with occasional light freezing rain or freezing drizzle, began late afternoon on November 29, and resulted in up to a tenth of an inch ice accumulation through the early morning of November 30. Snow developed again by early morning, becoming heavy at times during the afternoon. Snowfall totals by early Sunday reached 6.2 inches at Huron, 7.7 inches 1 miles south of Huron, and 11.0 inches 2 miles southeast of Wessington. In addition, winds gusted to 40 mph at Wolsey and 44 mph at Huron with areas of blowing snow. One passenger was killed (indirect) and another passenger injured (indirect) when the vehicle they were riding in lost control on icy roads and rolled into the ditch around 4 miles south of Cavour.

Wider weather episode

Close on the heels of the last winter storm, an amplified upper-air pattern brought another impulse out of the southwestern U.S. early on Friday, November 29 and pushed a shield of light mixed precipitation northeastward across the region with a light accumulation of ice. As the main trough and area of low pressure organized on Saturday, November 30 across Nebraska and deepened as it moved into southern Wisconsin by the morning of Sunday, December 1, additional snowfall developed and was accompanied by strong and gusty northwest winds of 30 to 50 mph by later Saturday night into Sunday morning.

Snowfall totals over the period generally ranged from 6 to 16 inches west of the James River, to less than one inch from northeast Nebraska and far southeast South Dakota toward southern portions of northwest Iowa. Another mesoscale band of heavy snowfall occurred on Saturday, November 30 near the Minnesota-Iowa border with between 6 and 9 inches accumulation.

This storm continued into December 1, although a majority of accumulating snowfall ended between 0000 and 0900CST.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 868057. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.