StormProof → hail seasons → Cedar Rapids → 1997
Cedar Rapids hail season 1997
15 NWS-recorded hail reports ≥1″ within 25 miles, across 3 storm days, max 2.75". Every one of those reports is a dated, located, citable official record — the context behind this market's 1997 claim volume.
Biggest storm days (1997, final record)
| Date | ≥1″ reports | Max hail | Areas named in the record |
|---|---|---|---|
| May 18, 1997 | 12 | 2.75" | JOHNSON, IOWA, LINN, BENTON |
| June 21, 1997 | 2 | 1.75" | LINN |
| August 3, 1997 | 1 | 1.75" | BENTON |
“A 15 minute "rain" of baseball sized hail caused $30 to $50 million dollars of damage. One insurance agent said "this was the worst storm since 1967." He went on to say; "everyone he insures who has a skylight now has a broken skylight." This included the skylights over the swimming pool in the downtown Iowa City Holliday Inn. The average home claim was $3500 and the average car claim was $2500. The hail caused ”
— NWS event narrative, May 18, 1997 (NCEI Storm Events)
When it fell
May 12 · Jun 2 · Aug 1
Wind context: the record also holds 17 thunderstorm-wind events ≥50 kt (≈58 mph, the NWS severe criterion) in this radius for 1997 — relevant where the dispute is wind vs hail causation.
Working a Cedar Rapids claim from 1997?
These are aggregates. A claim file needs the per-address record: every recorded event within 1, 3 and 10 miles of the property, distances, official narratives, and citations an adjuster can check line by line. That's the report — generated in seconds, hosted on HailEvidence (the neutral evidence surface), formatted as an insurance-appeal attachment.
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Provenance
Final counts: NCEI Storm Events Database, file vintage c20260527, hail events with recorded magnitude ≥1.00″ and point coordinates within 25 miles of the Cedar Rapids anchor. NWS records are point and path observations. The absence of a nearby report does NOT prove that no hail fell at this address — it means no observation was logged nearby. A report of nearby hail documents the event; it does not by itself prove damage to a specific structure. Spotted an error? Email the address on our terms page and we correct against the source.