The lead meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Johnston says it’s unlikely the rest of Iowa will experience the kind of flooding that’s hit the 10 counties along the Mississippi River.
Brad Small says almost all of the flooding in eastern Iowa is caused by melting snow the fell in Minnesota and Wisconsin, “which is somewhat unusual because a lot of our spring floods are kind of a cumulative thing that started in the fall with maybe a wet fall and then we had a big winter of snowfall and then spring rains started and this is kind of unique that it’s almost entirely driven by the snow pack,” Small says.
“We’re actually kind of low on our rivers in central Iowa and the Missouri is quite low, too.”
Drought conditions exist in many areas of western Iowa and Small says it would take a lot of rain to change that.
There have already been more than two dozen confirmed tornadoes in Iowa so far this spring. That includes 11 that hit the state on March 31st. Donna Dubberke, the meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service office in Johnston, says storm spotters are important in identifying where tornadoes are forming.
“They fill in some of the gaps, so it’s ‘ground truth,'” Dubberke says, “and it lets us in real time calibrate what we’re seeing with the technology to what’s actually occurring.”
Dubberke and Small made their comments during taping of “Iowa Press” which airs tonight on Iowa PBS. The five National Weather Service offices that provide forecasts and weather warnings for Iowa are located in Omaha; Sioux Falls, South Dakota; Johnston, the Quad Cities and La Crosse, Wisconsin.