A few Severe Thunderstorm Warnings were needed Wednesday afternoon to cover some storms bringing large hail to a few locations in southeastern Iowa. While the second week of October is not a favored time of year for severe thunderstorms, it isn't necessarily rare for this time of year. The featured chart presents the weekly frequency and count of Severe Thunderstorm Warnings for Iowa. The top panel counts the number of distinct years with at least one warning and the bottom plots the total number of warnings since 1986 based on unofficial IEM archives. These events become the most rare during January and February, when near surface temperatures are the coldest and it becomes more difficult to develop significant instability to support large hail and or damaging winds to reach the surface.

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