Alert archive / South Dakota

Weather alerts in Pennington County, South Dakota

6,301 weather alerts since 1986, from the National Weather Service and the Storm Prediction Center. An alert counts here when it covered this county.

Pennington County and its neighbors

Each county as a circle sized by its count since 1986. Tap one for its archive.

Alerts
6,301
Warnings
2,786
Watches
798
Advisories
1,258
Busiest year
2019347 alerts
Average year
154over 41 years on file

Over time

By year

Before late 2005 the archive holds only tornado, severe thunderstorm, flash flood and marine warnings, and from 1997 SPC's watches, so the jump that year is the archive widening, not the weather.

By month of the year

Warning verification

How often warnings here had a storm report inside them, and how much warning the reports had.

From 2008 to 2025, 60% of tornado reports in Pennington County fell inside a tornado warning issued on average 3 minutes before, and 88% of the tornado warnings had no report inside them.

Tornado warnings by year

WarningsWith a reportFalse alarm ratioReportsInside a warningMean lead time
200820100%0
200930100%0
201020100%0
201110100%0
201210100%0
20132150%1100%4 min
2014110%333%0 min
201510100%0
20163167%1100%4 min
201930100%0
202010100%0
202110100%0
202420100%0
202520100%0
Share of tornado reports inside a tornado warning, by year.

Severe thunderstorm warnings by year

WarningsWith a reportFalse alarm ratioReportsInside a warningMean lead time
2008925145%4789%25 min
2009473036%3067%31 min
2010696210%5596%31 min
2011906627%9589%24 min
2012674927%4976%28 min
2013957125%9593%21 min
2014544124%5387%20 min
2015776516%7985%28 min
20161038220%8891%22 min
2017473134%4587%27 min
2018756316%9990%24 min
2019846325%11086%26 min
202012010513%17289%28 min
2021574619%6583%25 min
2022724932%6376%25 min
2023987326%11287%24 min
2024776219%8578%19 min
2025875932%6784%25 min

Flash flood warnings by year

WarningsWith a reportFalse alarm ratioReportsInside a warningMean lead time
20084175%0
20094175%0
20104325%14100%101 min
201120100%0
20136267%8100%43 min
201410100%0
20154175%0
2016220%2100%125 min
20186517%1080%26 min
20197529%786%73 min
2020220%0
202210100%20%
20233167%0

Years from 2008, the first full year of storm-based warnings. The year still running is on its own page.

Verified by the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's Cow, which matches each storm-based warning with the local storm reports inside its polygon while it was in force, within 15 km of its edge: a tornado warning counts as verified on a tornado report, a severe thunderstorm warning on hail of 1 inch or more, a gust of 58 mph or more, or wind damage, a flash flood warning on a flash flood report. The false alarm ratio is the share of warnings with no such report; "inside a warning" is the probability of detection, the share of reports that fell inside one; lead time runs from the warning's issue to each report inside it, counting zero for a report that came first. A warning with no report is not proof nothing happened: reports come from spotters, the public and damage surveys, and are thin where few people live.

By product

Every kind of product issued here, grouped by hazard. Each opens the same place narrowed to that product.

The latest warnings

The most recent on file, newest first.

IssuedProductOfficeLasted
Sep 10, 11:12 AM MDTRed Flag WarningUNR31 hr
Sep 7, 1:16 AM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR24 min
Sep 5, 5:40 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR14 min
Aug 23, 3:06 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR54 min
Aug 23, 2:20 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR32 min
Aug 23, 1:36 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR54 min
Aug 18, 8:05 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR32 min
Aug 18, 7:34 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR32 min
Aug 16, 4:58 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR47 min
Aug 12, 3:14 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningUNR46 min
Aug 12, 2:26 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm Warning Considerable damage threatUNR49 min
Aug 11, 9:53 PM MDTSevere Thunderstorm Warning Considerable damage threatUNR30 min

Nearby

Alerts in force nowTornadoes on recordForecastThe radar archive

Sources

National Weather Service watches, warnings, advisories and statements from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's VTEC archive, which reconstructs tornado, severe thunderstorm, flash flood and marine warnings back to 1986 from the NWS text archive. Storm Prediction Center watches and mesoscale discussions from SPC's archive through the Mesonet. County centers from the US Census Bureau. Warning verification from the Mesonet's Cow. Rebuilt daily.