With drought, hail, heavy rain, a microburst and perhaps overnight flooding, it has been a year of extreme weather in Douglas County and the rest of Kansas.

“I’ve always joked about how I’d like to live in Kansas just once during a normal year,” Douglas County Extension Service horticulturist Bruce Chladny said with a chuckle.

Douglas County experienced a mixture of light, moderate and heavy rainfall Friday. The National Weather Service issued a flood watch for the area scheduled to last until 7 this morning.

A couple of inches could fall before the heavy rain ends by this afternoon, 6News meteorologist Matt Sayers said. Lighter rain may fall again Sunday.

The rain and flood watch followed Sunday’s hailstorm, which damaged vehicles and roofs in Lawrence, adding to damage left by the March 12 microburst.

The weather roller coaster also has included early March rain followed by a few days of freezing temperatures and dry, warm weather.

“Every year is strange in Kansas,” said Charles Perry, research hydrologist with the U.S. Geological Survey in Lawrence. “Rarely is it average. This is a continental state with continental weather. It’s either raining or it’s not raining, in stretches.”

A young student from Pinckney Elementary hurries home at the end of school heading through the tunnel beneath 6th Street.

As of Thursday, only 2.20 inches of rain had fallen in Lawrence in April, according to 6News weather records. That is 0.92 inches below normal. Rainfall for the year registered 5.45 inches, nearly 3 inches below normal.

The U.S. Drought Monitor shows northeastern Kansas to be in an “extremely dry” area, while most of southeastern and east-central Kansas is in a moderate drought. Douglas County is right along the border.

“This is a good sign, this storm coming now,” Perry said.

Chladny agreed.

“I can’t say that it is going to be too much of a good thing because we are so dry,” Chladny said. “How fast it comes down is a lot more important than how much it comes down. If we get deluged, it could mean some erosion problems, and that will be more of an issue than a nice, soaking rain.”