Blizzard in North Dakota, Tornadoes Reported in Iowa and Minnesota

BISMARCK, N.D. (AP) — A possible tornado tore up a small Minnesota town and a blizzard forced the closure of the North Dakota Capitol, schools and roads, as spring storms wreaked havoc across the Upper Midwest.

In Iowa, a tornado hit near Gilmore City as a strong line of storms moved across the state overnight, the National Weather Service confirmed Wednesday.

The tornado was confirmed by a trained spotter southwest of the small town of Gilmore City and tracked several miles to the northeast, weather service meteorologist Rod Donavon in Des Moines said Wednesday.

Up to 10 tornadoes were reported across mostly the northern half of the state as the storms moved through, Donavon said, but only ones near Logan in western Iowa and near Stacyville and St. Ansgar in northeastern Iowa have been confirmed. Survey teams were headed to those areas Wednesday to determine whether tornadoes had touched down and to verify the intensity of those storms.

There have been no reports of serious injuries with the storms. The Pocahontas County Sheriff’s Office reported some homes and other rural buildings hit by the tornado near Gilmore City, the Des Moines Register reported.

The National Weather Service said the unconfirmed tornado in Minnesota took the roofs off houses, destroyed grain bins, snapped power lines and lifted a house off its foundation in Taopi late Tuesday.

Mower County Sheriff Steve Sandvik said dispatchers began getting calls from residents trapped in their damaged homes not long after a tornado warning siren sounded at 10:30 p.m. There were no reports of serious injuries. Weather service crews were assessing damage in Taopi Wednesday.

The North Dakota Capitol in Bismarck, along with scores of schools, government offices and roads, remained closed Wednesday as a blizzard continued to bear down on the state.

A blizzard warning remained in effect through Thursday. Up to 2 feet (60 centimeters) of snow was forecast for western and central North Dakota. The blizzard warning extended into eastern Montana and the northwestern corner of South Dakota.

“This is nutso,” Karley Gosch said as she braved the strong winds and pelting snow in Mandan, North Dakota.

Interstate 94 from the Montana border to Jamestown, a distance of about 260 miles (418 kilometers), remained closed because of treacherous conditions.

Bismarck and Mandan public schools were closed Wednesday, along with numerous colleges and universities.