Preliminary figures show nearly 700,000 acres of crops - mostly corn and soybeans - damaged from Sunday night storms in southeastern North Dakota, the Farm Service Agency says.

The National Weather Service said Wednesday that at least two tornadoes struck the area.

FSA specialist Dale Ihry said he expects the crop damage total to increase. He said the swath stretches across five counties. Officials are still compiling the numbers for Cass County.

"The largest area runs from south of Finley to McLeod - that would be Steele, Cass, Ransom counties - and the area of that storm damage is around 480,000 acres," Ihry said. "I'd say about half that crop in that area would be corn and soybeans, and damage ranging from minimal to 100 percent."

The information will be used as the state prepares a request for more federal disaster aid.

National Weather Service meteorologist Greg Gust said a damage survey indicates at least two and possibly four or five tornadoes were embedded in those storms on Sunday.

"It's a very distinct downburst wind pattern with tornadic episodes … with relatively narrow tracks of damage looking at 100, 120 mph winds," Gust said Wednesday.

The first of the tornadoes likely struck along a stretch from near Embden, in southwestern Cass County, Gust said.

The second group touched down along a stretch from just west of Tower City to near Alice, Gust said.

The damage suggests wind gusts in the range of 110 mph to 125 mph at times, giving the tornadoes a rating of EF1 to EF2 on the Enhanced Fujita scale, he said.

Southwestern North Dakota got hit by heavy rain Wednesday. The weather service said the airport about five miles south of Dickinson reported more than 2 inches of rain in less than an hour, and radar indicated up to 3 inches fell over eastern Slope and western Hettinger counties between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m.

Stark County Emergency Manager Gary Kostelecky said the deluge of water 12 miles south of Dickinson mainly filled ditches and creeks, and in some cases ran over county roads.

He said he expected more news from the rain event, but no basements flooded or roads washed out from the heavy rain. The water will end up in the Heart River drainage.

Farther east, Hettinger County Emergency Manager Ilene Hardmeyer said the highest rain amount in the Mott area was around half an inch, recorded north of town. She said otherwise small rain totals would likely not hinder harvest, which is just getting under way in some areas of the county.

The total from midnight to 6 a.m. Wednesday at the Dickinson airport was a record 3.03 inches, the weather service said. It topped the mark of 1.54 inches set in 1997.

In most of the city of Dickinson itself, however, rainfall measured less than half an inch.

(Tribune reporter Lauren Donovan contributed to this story.)