National Weather Service United States Department of Commerce

 

Wide view of systems impacting Indiana
Figure 1: Map of the Tropical Systems & Remnants to move across central Indiana. Click to enlarge.

 

Map of systems moving across central Indiana
Figure 2: Zoomed in map of tracks, with most tracks labeled. Click the image for a larger version.

 

Tropical cyclone (an organized area of low pressure that develops over tropical waters) remnants can move into central Indiana. The most common impact to central Indiana from these remnants is rainfall, sometimes heavy. However, they can bring damaging winds and help spawn tornadoes. The remnants of Hurricane Ike brought damaging winds to central Indiana in 2008.

The NOAA Office for Coastal Management has a searchable archive for tropical system tracks.

Figure 1 is a static map of systems that moved across Indiana.

For this search for systems near central Indiana, any system that originated in the North Atlantic Basin and moved within 100 miles (87 nautical miles) of the center of Indianapolis was considered.

There were 22 systems whose remnant low pressure areas moved nearby central Indiana from 1866-2023

Figure 2 is a static map of the systems that moved within 100 miles of Indianapolis. Most of the systems have their names plotted on the map.

Current tropical systems are monitored by the National Hurricane Center.

See farther down the page for details about the systems impacting the area.

List of Tropical Systems that Moved Across Central Indiana through 2023
Name Tropical Cyclone Dates Central Indiana Date* Indianapolis Rainfall**
Unnamed May 24 to May 31, 1863 Unknown Unknown
Unnamed Sep 25 to Oct 6, 1898 Oct 4 0.75"
Unnamed Aug 2 to Aug 18, 1901 Aug 18 1.09"
Unnamed Jun 21 to Jun 29, 1902 Jun 28-29 2.44"
Unnamed Aug 5 to Aug 23, 1915 Aug 20-21 1.46"
Unnamed Aug 31 to Sep 6, 1915 Sep 6-7 0.34"
Unnamed Oct 16 to Oct 21, 1923 Oct 18 2.15"
Unnamed Jul 22 to Aug 2, 1926 Aug 1 1.58"
Unnamed Aug 26 to Sep 4, 1932 Sep 3 2.00"
Unnamed Sep 18 to Sep 21, 1932 Sep 20-21 1.45"
Unnamed Jun 12 to Jun 18, 1939 Jun 17-18 0.01"
Unnamed Sep 17 to Sep 27, 1941 Sep 25 0.16"
Unnamed Sep 1 to Sep 6, 1948 Sep 5-6 1.48"
Candy Jun 22 to Jun 26. 1968 Jun 25 0.71"
Bob Jul 9 to Jul 16, 1979 Jul 12-13 4.36"
Claudette Jul 15 to Jul 29, 1979 Jul 28 2.95"
Erin Jul 31 to Aug 06, 1995 Aug 5-6 0.35"
Arlene Jun 8 to Jun 14, 2005 Jun 12-13 3.12"
Dennis Jul 4 to Jul 18, 2005 Jul 12-16 1.27"
Katrina Aug 23 to Aug 31, 2005 Aug 30 2.16"
Ike Sep 1 to Sep 15, 2008 Sep 14 0.22"
Alberto May 25 to May 31, 2018 May 30 0.26"


* - dates are approximate
** - Rainfall may be influenced by other systems. Rain may have fallen on dates on either side of those listed due to other systems
Indianapolis was chosen due to its longer period of record for rainfall data.
 

The multiple tropical remnants in 1979 caused significant flash flooding in parts of central Indiana. See this excerpt from the Storm Data publication for details.

Notes: Moisture from other tropical remnants may have impacted the area and are not listed here. Some notable remnants fell just outside the 100 mile radius. Other parts of Indiana may have had much higher impacts than central Indiana for some remnants.
Additional information can be found by expanding the search parameters on the archive website and by looking through the Storm Data publication archives.

 

Thanks to WFO Chicago for the inspiration for this page..