High winds / Blowing dust in OK/TX

[Jeff Snyder]

This is a non-convective event, so discussion of the ongoing wind/dust activity is permissible in W&C.

A couple hours ago, the dust moved into the Oklahoma City area. An extremely strong pressure gradient is creating wind gusts of 65-70mph in parts of the Oklahoma and Texas panhandles, with 45-60mph gusts in parts of western and central Oklahoma.

CLICK HERE for a saved image of visible satellite showing the dust in TX and OK.

CLICK HERE for a map of the highest wind gusts today from the Oklahoma Mesonet.

Below is a picture I just took from outside my apartment in Edmond:

 

[Kenny Drake]

We have had a few sprinkles mix in with the dust in Norman, of course leading to possibily the dirtiest precip you can get. I happened to be driving at the time and with the wind and low Tds they evaporated off the windshield fairly quickly to leave brown spots plastered everywhere. I would add some pics but I have no idea where my el cheapo camera went. My cell phone camera is actually not that bad, but I have no way of transferring them to a computer.

 

[David Drummond]

It was a total brownout earlier this morning here SW of LBB. I couldn't see more than a block away. My power has been off most of the day. It comes on for 20 minute spurts then is off and on frequently and is off again. It's on right now, hope it stays that way.

The winds and blowing dust have diminished considerably here from this morning finally. It's still blowing strong, but NOTHING like it was. One of the top 10 worst one's I've seen. I just wasn't in the mood to go out and shoot in it today.

 

[Jay McCoy]

here in Amarillo we havent has a much dust as further south towards David because when the wrap around came through we had a brief 1-2 hr window of sleet and heavy snow!! The flakes were huge as the temp was right at freezing. Precip has ended and hopefullly limits the dust but we have all kinds of debris flying around. Highest gusts have been close to 60mph in the city with many areas above 60. Havent heard about power outages but I am sure there are.

 

[Bob Schafer]

Even out here in Los Alamos NM, we had a gust of 52mph at 1215Z this morning. No dust, though, as we're in the mountains.

http://www.met.utah.edu/cgi-bin/roman/meso_base.cgi?&unit=0&time=GMT&stn=LANL1

 

[Kenny Drake]

Seems like the wind has been wreaking havoc on the OK Mesonet, current data from mesonet.org shows no reports for a pretty large chunk southwest of Norman. Of course, this may have nothing at all to do with the wind but it seems like a high probability. I believe all OK Mesonet sites use solar power along with a battery so power outages shouldnt affect them. Perhaps OCS' extensive QA analysis is removing all of the obs from those sites for whatever reason.

 

[David Drummond]

I just got back from running and errand and noted one of the community airport buildings, I think it was a small hangar, lost about 75% of it's roof. No doubt there is similar damage around the area. Maybe I will have more time tomorrow to get out and look around. According to the closest mesonet station, peak wind gust was 63.8 mph.

 

[Bob Schafer]

Vis Sat image

Check out this vis sat imagery from 2210Z:

http://new.photos.yahoo.com/scudstudbob/photo/294928804248376336/0

 

[Jeff Gammons]

Here's a pretty cool Visible satellite loop over Texas/Oklahoma of todays blowing dust event. Blog post

http://www.stormvideographer.com/weathervine/blog_blowing_dust_storm.gif

 

[Bart_Comstock]

The dust and high winds made for an interesting drive home today. I stopped along the side of HWY-412 today as the dust caught up with me in Delaware Co., Oklahoma just outside of Kansas, Oklahoma. Here are some pics I took with my cell phone. Not all the photos are in order of when I took them and I did not take all of them at the same time.

Looking SW:

Looking SW:

Looking WSW:

Looking N:

Looking ESE:

Looking E, as the dust blew off in the distance with the sun setting behind me:

 

[JP Santiago]

Scattered power outages across the DFW area today from the high winds. About 100 flights out of DFW got cancelled because of excessive crosswinds with the westerly winds blowing right across the N-S oriented parallel runways. Made for an interesting sight to see planes take off to the north at DFW and hang a sharp left to turn westward into the winds.

Visibility was down to about 1/2 miles in my area, some downed powerlines snarled things on FM 1709 between Southlake and Grapevine. Probably the thickest part of the duststorm came right before 3pm in my area- I happened to be on the Grapevine Lake dam and at the midpoint of the dam road, you couldn't see either the south or north shorelines- probably less than a 1/2 mile visibility?

 

[Rodney Harper]

Does anyone know where I can find the highest wind gust reported in the D/FW metro or can tell me where to get it. We were without power for about 2 hours today and lost our high speed and cable connection also. It is still not up to speed by any means. It was ugly when the dust came in the sky was orange and I noted some pretty severe roof damage in the area also. Seems like it was over the 40mph gusts that were forecasted.

 

[Bobby Eddins]

Looks like Meacham won with a gust to 58

000
NOUS44 KFWD 250244 CCA
PNSFWD
TXZ091>095-100>107-115>123-129>135-141>148-156>162-174-175-260000-

PUBLIC INFORMATION STATEMENT...CORRECTED
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FORT WORTH TX
830 PM CST SAT FEB 24 2007

...HIGH WINDS ACROSS NORTH TEXAS ON SATURDAY...

SATURDAY WAS ONE OF THE WINDIEST DAYS OF THE LAST DECADE...COMPLETE
WITH BLOWING DUST.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

WIND GUSTS EXCEEDED 50 MPH AT MANY LOCATIONS ACROSS NORTH TEXAS.
THE FOLLOWING ARE THE PEAK WINDS AT NORTH TEXAS AIRPORTS SATURDAY.
ALL VALUES ARE IN MILES PER HOUR.


DFW AIRPORT 56
DALLAS LOVE 48
FORT WORTH MEACHAM 58
DALLAS EXECUTIVE 51
DALLAS ADDISON 46
FORT WORTH ALLIANCE 55
NAS FORT WORTH JRB 53
FORT WORTH SPINKS 49
ARLINGTON 47
GRAND PRAIRIE 55
LANCASTER 52
MESQUITE 46

Does anyone know where I can find the highest wind gust reported in the D/FW metro or can tell me where to get it. We were without power for about 2 hours today and lost our high speed and cable connection also. It is still not up to speed by any means. It was ugly when the dust came in the sky was orange and I noted some pretty severe roof damage in the area also. Seems like it was over the 40mph gusts that were forecasted.

 

[Jonathan.Brazzell]

Here are some images from Abilene, TX taken during the Skywarn Class. Quite an impressive blow.

 

[John Diel]

Yet another satellite view:

http://www.osei.noaa.gov/Events/Current/DSTusplain057_MO.jpg