Avoca, Iowa
10 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1954 and the latest in 1994. It stands in Knox Township. It lies in ZIP code area 51521. It stands on Ballard Creek. The Survey maps it on the Avoca quadrangle. 1,683 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,194 feet above sea level.
On record in Avoca
Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.
On the National Register 4 records
Graceland Cemetery Chapellisted 1986
Charles Henry and Charlotte Norton Houselisted 2004
Pottawattamie County Sub Courthouselisted 1981
Francis A. and Rose M. Turner Houselisted 1997
Population over time
2 figuresAvoca grew from 1,506 to 1,683 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 1,506 | |
| 2020 | 1,683 | +177 (+12%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
6 surveys from 10 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1954 USGS Omaha quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1957 USGS Omaha quadrangle1:250000
- 1958 USGS Omaha quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1963 USGS Avoca quadrangle1:24000
- 1985 USGS Omaha quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
- 1994 USGS Avoca quadrangle1:24000
Fires near this place
5 since 2014Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 5 fires within 5 miles of Avoca between 2014 and 2017, burning about 40 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Debris and open burning | 3 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8 April 2014 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 4.0 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 16 April 2014 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 3.0 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 22 March 2017 | Debris and open burning | 20 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 18 March 2017 | Debris and open burning | 5.0 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 15 March 2015 | Debris and open burning | 7.5 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
1 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 1 working within 5 miles of Avoca: 1 producer. All of them still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Avoca Plant | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Producer |
Storms near this place
28 since 1994Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Avoca in 28 storm reports between 1994 and 2023: 14 hail, 9 thunderstorm wind, 3 flood, 2 tornado. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 2007 | Flood | Avoca | $1,560,000 | Heavy rainfall over the weekend of May 4th through the 6th, caused the West Nishnabotna River to flood across Pottawattamie county. The West Nishnabotna River at Hancock crested around 20.5 feet between 1130 pm and midnight May 6th. Flood stage is 14 feet. The river at Hancock first crossed flood stage around 6 am cdt May 6th and didn't drop below flood stage until around 1 pm cdt on the 7th. The flooding affected farmland and many county roads in the area from around Avoca through Hancock. Some homes were also damaged. |
| November 2015 | Tornado (EF1) | Avoca | $250,000 | The tornado started just south of the County Road 18 to the west of the city of Avoca, Iowa. The tornado tracked to the north northeast through open fields initially. Due to the recent harvest the tornado was easily tracked through the fields due to ground scouring of the left-over corn stocks. The tornado narrowly missed a farmstead along 420th street but did destroy one empty grain bin located across the street from the farm. The tornado continued to track across open fields until it crossed the busy Interstate 80 where a semi was lofted and tossed into a ditch on the north side of the interstate. At this location there were also large hardwood trees that were uprooted. The tornado continued to the northeast into Shelby County. |
| July 1994 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | $50,000 | no account filed |
| June 2010 | Flood | Avoca | $1,000 | Heavy rain during the early morning hours of June 27th caused the West Nishnabotna River to briefly surpass flood stage around Hancock. The river crested at close to 14.5 feet during the afternoon of the 27th, flood stage is 14 feet. Some minor flooding occurred near a park in Hancock along with agricultural lowlands. |
| July 2023 | Tornado (EF0) | Avoca | - | There is a distinct tornado track through crop fields approximately 40 yards wide at the max. The track begins in a soybean field and then moves into the corn field where the narrow track and convergent flow pattern are most pronounced. It crosses a creek, breaks a few branches, and then through another corn field where there is convergent flow into the center of the track from the edges. |
| June 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | - | Public reported a semi blown over on the interstate. |
| December 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | - | Storm chaser reported a semi rolled over on I80. |
| December 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | - | Mesonet station RAVI4 measured a peak wind gust of 67 mph. |
| September 2019 | Hail | Avoca | - | A trained spotter reported hail up to golf ball size. |
| September 2019 | Hail | Avoca | - | The public reported hail up to half dollar size. |
| April 2018 | Hail | Avoca | - | Nickel size hail reported east of Avoca. |
| June 2018 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | - | Large tree limbs (24 inch in diameter) and trees blown down in Avoca and across US Highway 59. |
| April 2010 | Hail | Avoca | - | Hail up to 1.5 inches in diameter caused rather extensive damage to cars and even some houses in the Avoca area. |
| June 2008 | Flood | Avoca | - | Heavy rain for the second consecutive day produced flooding along the West Nishnabotna River in Pottawattamie county. The river at Hancock crested at 15.8 feet at 745 pm CDT on 6/9, flood stage is 14 feet. The river was above flood stage from around 230 pm on 6/8 until 615 am on 6/9.||The flooding affected mainly agricultural lowlands. |
| July 2008 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | - | An Iowa Department of Highway Rwis station measured a thunderstorm wind gust of 60 mph along Interstate 80 near Avoca. |
| June 2007 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | - | The Pottawattamie county dispatch reported that thunderstorm wind gusts estimated at 70 mph downed a few trees in Avoca. |
| August 2007 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | - | A thunderstorm wind gust estimated at 60 mph was reported near Avoca. |
| June 2004 | Thunderstorm Wind | Avoca | - | Thunderstorm wind gusts estimated to near 60 mph were reported in Avoca. |
| July 2003 | Hail | Avoca | - | Some of the hail was still on the ground at daybreak. |
| March 2017 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
| July 2013 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
| June 2007 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
| May 2005 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
| June 2005 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
| May 2004 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
| July 2003 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
| May 2001 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
| July 1998 | Hail | Avoca | - | no account filed |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Newtown (historical) | 1.6 miles | 10 | |
| Harlan Junction (historical) | 2.0 miles | 10 | |
| Hancock | 6.1 miles | 10 | |
| Walnut | 6.2 miles | 9 | |
| Iola (historical) | 10.2 miles | 9 | |
| Minden | 10.9 miles | 11 | |
| Oakland | 12.0 miles | 9 | |
| York Center | 13.5 miles | 11 |
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Avoca | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q1914591 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 454290. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.





