Area roads and parking lots are dry again.
Many were turning into rivers and lakes after heavy rain fell in a short period of time in parts of the Rainy River district yesterday
A rain gauge at Fort Frances High School measured almost 4 centimetres in one hour.
According to Signal Weather Services’ Bill Laidlaw, 12 millimetres fell at the Fort Frances airport which was on the edge of the cell.
Twenty-one millimetres was recorded at Falls Airport.
“Usually with some major thunderstorms, you get multiple cells so that’s where you get a lot more rain out of that. This was just a single individual storm cell that was traveling quickly from the west to the east through town. Unfortunately, it overwhelmed the storm sewer system in downtown Fort Frances,” says Laidlaw.
Laidlaw says there was thunderstorm activity elsewhere in the region. Ignace and Upsala received similar amounts of rain but it came over a longer period of time.
The storm did close the Portage Avenue underpass in Fort Frances for a couple of hours because of pooling water.
Hail, lightning and strong winds were also part of the mid-day storm.
There were reports of a fire on Grindestone Island on Rainy Lake caused by a lightning strike.
No other details are immediately available.
