The very early morning hours on this Tuesday were somewhat active, as a small complex of strong to severe thunderstorms rumbled from west-to-east through the heart of this six-county North Central Kansas area mainly between 12:30-4:00 a.m. CDT. The overall-most-intense portion of this complex generally tracked within 10 miles either side of the Phillips/Rooks, Smith/Osborne and Jewell/Mitchell County lines. Although ground-truth reports were limited in part by the time of day, there were a few severe-criteria wind gusts measured in both Rooks County (including 60 MPH at Rooks County Airport) and also Mitchell County (63 MPH per a mesonet near Beloit). As for hail, the only report consisted of nickel size stones in Beloit, although radar data strongly suggested that larger hail likely fell in spots, particularly along portions of the Phillips/Rooks County line.
Things got underway within the local area between 12:30-2:00 a.m. CDT as an already severe-warned and initially-isolated storm entered the area from the west and lumbered across northern Rooks/southern Phillips counties (prompting the severe-criteria winds near Stockton). Between 2-4 a.m. CDT this initially slow-moving, cellular convection transitioned to a more linear mode as it picked up speed somewhat through mainly northern Osborne and Mitchell counties before departing stage right into northeast Kansas. In the mid-upper levels, large-scale forcing for this early morning event was a bit nebulous, with North Central Kansas residing under fairly weak quasi-zonal flow, well-south of a potent shortwave trough spinning along the ND-Canada border. In addition, convective inhibition/capping was rather inhospitable to lower-level parcels, as evidenced by 700 millibar temperatures around 14-15 C. However, this somewhat-elevated activity appeared to be mainly driven by modest low-mid level warm air/moisture advection within the exit region of a 30-40 knot southwesterly low level jet emanating out of southwestern Kansas. Around the time that the severe storm first entered Rooks/Phillips counties, the mesoscale environment featured 2000 J/kg most-unstable CAPE but no more than 25-30 knots of deep-layer wind shear.

Thunderstorm Wind in MITCHELL, KANSAS
From 10-AUG-21 02:05:00 to 10-AUG-21 02:05:00 (CST-6)
Location: BELOIT
Magnitude: 55.00 MG
Property damage: 0.00K
Crop damage: 0.00K
Reported by: Mesonet

A wind gust of 63 MPH was measured by a mesonet station located four miles west-southwest of Beloit.

Hail in MITCHELL, KANSAS
From 10-AUG-21 02:12:00 to 10-AUG-21 02:12:00 (CST-6)
Location: BELOIT
Magnitude: 0.88 
Property damage: 0.00K
Crop damage: 0.00K
Reported by: State Official

Thunderstorm Wind in ROOKS, KANSAS
From 10-AUG-21 00:29:00 to 10-AUG-21 00:29:00 (CST-6)
Location: STOCKTON
Magnitude: 52.00 MG
Property damage: 0.00K
Crop damage: 0.00K
Reported by: AWOS

A wind gust of 60 MPH was measured by the AWOS at Rooks County Regional Airport.

Thunderstorm Wind in ROOKS, KANSAS
From 10-AUG-21 00:35:00 to 10-AUG-21 00:35:00 (CST-6)
Location: STOCKTON
Magnitude: 50.00 MG
Property damage: 0.00K
Crop damage: 0.00K
Reported by: Mesonet

A wind gust of 58 MPH was measured by a mesonet station located on the south side of Stockton.