Storms blast through region
Published 1:06 pm Thursday, April 3, 2025
A fallen tree crushes a vehicle parked outside a home on College Street in Woodburn on Thursday morning, April 3, 2025, following strong storms Wednesday evening. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
A field is flooded by continued rainfall in Woodburn on Thursday morning, April 3, 2025, following strong storms Wednesday evening. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
A tree broken by high winds and strong storms Wednesday evening lays in fragments in Plano on Thursday morning, April 3, 2025. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
A pedestrian walks groceries home in the rain near Chestnut Street in Bowling Green on Thursday, April 3, 2025. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
AT&T and Spectrum linemen work to repair downed lines due to a fallen tree on the corner of Chestnut Street and 4th Avenue in Bowling Green on Thursday, April 3, 2025, following strong storms Wednesday evening. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
AT&T and Spectrum linemen work to repair downed lines due to a fallen tree on the corner of Chestnut Street and 4th Avenue in Bowling Green on Thursday, April 3, 2025, following strong storms Wednesday evening. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
A fallen tree crushes a vehicle parked outside a home on College Street in Woodburn on Thursday morning, April 3, 2025, following strong storms Wednesday evening. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
A fallen tree crushes a vehicle parked outside a home on College Street in Woodburn on Thursday morning, April 3, 2025, following strong storms Wednesday evening. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
AT&T and Spectrum linemen work to repair downed lines due to a fallen tree on the corner of Chestnut Street and 4th Avenue in Bowling Green on Thursday, April 3, 2025, following strong storms Wednesday evening. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
AT&T and Spectrum linemen work to repair downed lines due to a fallen tree on the corner of Chestnut Street and 4th Avenue in Bowling Green on Thursday, April 3, 2025, following strong storms Wednesday evening. GRACE MCDOWELL / DAILY NEWS
Heavy rains, carried by whipping winds, drenched southcentral Kentucky overnight Thursday, the opening salvo of a weather system expected to linger through Sunday and drop several inches of rain.
As of 9 a.m. Thursday, 3.16 inches of rain had fallen in Allen County in the previous 24 hours, according to the Kentucky Mesonet weather tracking system.
That represented the largest rainfall measurement in the state among Mesonet trackers for that period.
Kentucky Mesonet showed wind gusts peaking at 56.1 miles per hour in Warren County, while Simpson County recorded a top wind gust of 54.5 miles per hour.
A large portion of southcentral Kentucky was under a tornado warning shortly after midnight Thursday.
The National Weather Service issued a flood warning Thursday morning for a swath of southcentral Kentucky that included Warren and immediately surrounding counties.
Drakes Creek near Alvaton is under a flood warning that remains in effect through Monday, with the NWS forecasting that the waterway would rise above the flood stage of 24 feet Thursday night, falling below flood stage Saturday night and rising back above flood level late Sunday morning.
Warren County Government posted on its Facebook page Thursday morning that Goodrum Road and Hadley Cohron Road were closed.
Broken poles and downed power lines led to about 7,000 Warren Rural Electric Co-operative Corporation customers losing power.
Warren RECC said Thursday morning that about 500 members remain without power and that 23 broken poles have been documented.
“We expect to restore power to all members from last night’s storms today, as long as weather conditions continue to permit us to work,” WRECC said in a news release, adding that further rounds of severe weather Thursday night and potentially this weekend could result in additional outages.
The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet District 3 reported three road closures of state roads in Allen County and two in Butler County on Thursday morning due to flooding.
In a news release, the state transportation cabinet said that District 3 crews from each county are monitoring road conditions and expecting additional closures as more rain and severe weather is forecast for the area through the weekend.
Warren County Emergency Management deputy director Travis Puckett said that the office had not received any reports of damage in the county, and that information had been relayed to the National Weather Service.
“Right now we’re watching the rain that is coming in and seeing where it goes from there,” Puckett said.
Several first responding agencies posted on social media about likely flooding in the area, warning travelers against attempting to drive over flooded roads.
The Warren County Sheriff’s Office posted Wednesday on its Facebook page that drivers who bypass a barricade on a closed road would be issued careless driving citations.
Additional rain is expected, with the NWS forecasting Thursday morning an additional 6-8 inches of rain falling in Warren County through Sunday and parts of Logan County and Butler County potentially receiving 8-10 inches of rain in that same timespan.
The Simpson County Office of Emergency Management posted a road closure map Thursday morning on its website showing seven closures in the county.
“As expected we are beginning to get the heavy rains that will continue to bring the flood waters up predictably like we experienced in February so please, have a plan and prepare accordingly,” said a post on the Simpson County emergency management office’s Facebook page.
