(Atlantic, Iowa) – A severe thunderstorm moved through the area early yesterday (Wednesday) morning. Emergency Management Coordinator Mike Kennon says although there were no reported injuries, widespread damages were evident. Winds in excess of 70 mph knocked down trees, large limbs and created some property damages with power outages. Strong winds also laid down field corn in areas.

While performing Damage Assessments, Kennon noticed that some damages were more severe, very concentrated and seemed to run in a line. A drone was deployed and found that his suspicions were correct. There is a clear path of damage that runs along 4th Street in Marne to a cattle feeding operation at 580th and Eastland Road and ends southeast of the intersection of Eastland Road and 590th. This line is nearly 3 miles long. Similar damage was also noticed in the City of Cumberland and in a couple of other rural locations in Cass County.

Drone picture taken by Cass County Sheriff’s Deputy, Ben Bartholomew.

Mike Kennon was interested in what the National Weather Service thought of this, so he submitted pictures and the drone video footage for their evaluation. Rod Donovan of the NWS-Des Moines said, “ It certainly appears there may have been some spin up circulations along the leading edge of the storm. Likely the radar beam started overshooting these features, so they were quite shallow features.”

The National Weather Service does not currently plan to perform a preliminary storm survey at this time.