Minnesota weather is part of daily life, and it brings with it many “extremes.” This collection presents some of those…from the floods of the Red River Valley, the blowdown in the BWCA, the Halloween Blizzard, to the devasting tornado in St. Peter. But were a state of many meteorological dimensions, not just tornadoes and blizzards. Below are memories of oppressive drought, the creep of flood waters, nature driven fire, and those glorious 50-degree December day anomalies. While these stories may attempt to explain the why, where, and what of various weather events, what is striking is the undeniable power of the human experience in the face of it all.
May 10, 2001 - MPR’s Lorna Benson interviews David Gisch, the Emergency Preparedness coordinator for Dakota County, about damage assessment after several tornadoes and funnel clouds touched down along a path south of the Twin Cities. Gisch says the damage is most severe in a farming area just east of Northfield.
June 12, 2001 - MPR’s Tim Post reports on how residents of central Minnesota spent the day cleaning up and assessing damage from storms that moved across the area on June 11, 2001. Several communities suffered significant damage caused by tornadoes, straight-line winds and hail.
June 14, 2001 - MPR’s Tim Post reports on severe weather that hammered Central Minnesota for the second time in less than a week. Storm after storm dumped 2 to 5 inches of rain on the area, straight line winds knocked down power poles and damaged homes.
July 4, 2001 - MPR’s Lorna Benson talks with Marlin Bree, a boater who was among a few unlucky people caught on Lake Superior when hundred-mile-an-hour winds whipped up 30-foot waves.
November 27, 2001 - MPR’s Bob Kelleher reports that while the snowfall in Duluth from storm is not immense, the wind hitting Lake Superior is, creating damage…and spectacle.
November 27, 2001 - Mainstreet Radio’s Tim Post spent the morning with his neighbors, shoveling more than a foot of heavy, wet snow. A powerful winter storm buried central and western Minnesota with as much as 30 inches of snow. The heaviest band of snow stretched from Willmar to St. Cloud.
November 28, 2001 - MPR’s Cathy Wurzer talks with Les Heitke, the mayor in Willmar, about snowstorm that stalled over that city and buried it in snow.
April 16, 2002 - Craig Edwards, Meteorolgist-in-Charge at the National Weather Service; and Mark Seeley, Climatologist and Meteorologist at the University of Minnesota, discuss the favorite Minnesotan conversation topic, weather, in honor of "Severe Weather Awareness Week."
June 17, 2002 - People in Roseau, near the Canadian border, are beginning the process of cleaning up after the worst flood in that town's history. Water from the rain-swollen Roseau River receded over the weekend, after nearly a full week of devastation. City officials place early damage estimates at more than $120 million dollars as residents are discovering just how much they've lost.
June 25, 2002 - State climatologist Bruce Watson explains the concept of wet-dry cycle and how recent heavy rains are part of a long term weather cycle. 8 inches of rain fell in the metro area on the night of June 24, 2002. Watson says the month ranks among the top ten soggiest on record.