Father’s Day storm brings flooding

Staff Report
The tornado sirens sounded in Newkirk early Monday morning after the National Weather Service advised people there to take cover. A tornado warning had been issued for northwestern Kay County until 1 a.m.
The NWS reported it had seen a tornado forming west of Newkirk. However, the NWS let the tornado warning expire, stating that the threat was now just straight line winds. People in the tornado shelters were advised to stay there until the winds subsided.
The storm dumped over three inches of rain in Newkirk and prompted the NWS to issue a flash flood warning for the area until 5 a.m. There were reports of street flooding in Ponca City following the storm.
Newkirk received just under five inches of rain over the weekend. Ponca City received just under seven inches during that same period. Several roads around Kay County on Monday morning were flooded.
Kay County Electric Coop reported there were 44 outages in Kay County just before 7 a.m. Monday. There were no outages in Kay County by the end of the day Monday.
Later that morning, Newkirk Fire Chief Adam Longcrier explained that his department was starting to see storms form west of Newkirk around midnight.
“We then got word of a possible tornado touch down near Braman that formed quickly and touched down without warning,” he said. “We contacted the National Weather Service in Norman and were advised the storm that produced the touch down by Braman was headed east towards Peckham and Newkirk and that Newkirk needed to take cover.”
Longcrier said his department immediately blew the sirens and got a hold of the storm shelters. “The reason the shelters were opened after the sirens went off was because this hit so fast and without warning,” he explained. “We stayed in constant contact with the NWS in Norman and made sure we knew where the rotation was. The storm and rotation went south of Newkirk.”
Longcrier explained that this was a QLCS tornado, which are among the hardest tornadoes to prepare for because they spin up rapidly between radar scans. Warnings are sometimes issued right as the tornado touches down.
A similar tornado occurred just 24 hours earlier north of Wichita that killed one man. The EF-2 had not received a tornado warning prior to its arrival and was only on the ground for two minutes, according to the NWS.
It marked the second night in a row for overnight storms in Newkirk. The Sunday morning storm caused local flooding. The intersection of Peckham and Pleasant View Roads was briefly underwater. A power outage affected several residents. Power began to be restored in Newkirk by noon Sunday.
A spokesperson for the Newkirk Fire Department reported that a tree had fallen on a main line in the 600 block of Academy.
Highway 177, north out of Blackwell, was closed Tuesday  morning due to flooding from the Chikaskia River. The river surpassed flood stage at just over 32 feet. Blackwell reported over five inches of rain early Monday. The flooding also prompted the closure of the golf course on Monday.
Kaw Lake, which receives its inflow from the Arkansas River, was over 11 feet above normal Tuesday morning with an inflow of over 31,000 cubic feet per second. That inflow had peaked earlier this week when it was briefly at over 50,000 cubic feet per second.