Power Outage in Kirwin, KS

This Wednesday was only an opening act to many markedly windy days within North Central Kansas during April 2022 (per analysis of data from nearby Concordia/Hill City airports this was likely the overall-windiest April since at least 1996). Primarily between the mid-morning and late afternoon hours, sustained northwesterly winds were commonly at least 25-35 MPH with frequent gusts 45-55 MPH...and there were a few measured marginally-severe criteria gusts up to 58 MPH. The overall-strongest winds targeted Phillips, Rooks, Smith and Osborne counties, including unofficial peak gusts of 58 MPH at Phillipsburg airport (AWOS) and Logan (mesonet). Although there were no known reports of notable wind damage, the combination of strong winds and ongoing drought conditions promoted fairly widespread areas of blowing dust, reducing visibility to one mile or less in various locations. ||In the mid-upper levels, the main player in what would end up being a two-day high wind event for the local area (along with the 7th) was a powerful/deep closed low churning over the northern Minnesota/Wisconsin region. At the surface, a nearly co-located intense low pressure center bottomed out around 988 millibars across MN/WI during the day. This placed the state of Kansas in a favorable environment for high winds within the southwest quadrant of the large-scale low. At mid-day (18Z), a respectable northeast-to-southwest pressure gradient of 12 millibars was noted across the state (ranging from 1006 millibars in far northeast KS to 1018 millibars far southwest). Furthermore, steep low-level lapse rates allowed efficient downward momentum transfer from aloft during the daylight hours, with wind speeds in the 850-700 millibar layer averaging 40-50 knots.

April 06, 2022

Thunderstorm Wind. Wind gusts estimated to be near 70 MPH resulted in the destruction of an 8 foot by 12 foot shed and a grain elevator leg blown down in Stuttgart. In the Prairie View area, power lines and power poles were damaged.

June 19, 2021

Thunderstorm Wind. A wind gust of 60 MPH was measured by a mesonet station located 1 mile west of Logan. Power lines were blown down across a road on the north side of Logan and forced a temporary road closure.

June 19, 2021

A strong cold front brought intense non-thunderstorm and thunderstorm related wind gusts to north central Kansas on the evening of October 11th. This front entered western portions of north central Kansas between 7pm and 8pm CDT. The cold front already had a history of producing severe caliber, non-thunderstorm, straight line winds over western Nebraska and Kansas, and this trend continued along and just behind the cold front as it marched through north central Kansas. There were several reports of wind gusts of 60 to 65 mph across Phillips, Smith, and Osborne Counties. Damage reports from these areas were fairly typical for winds of this magnitude and mainly limited to tree and power line damage. Thunderstorms began to develop along the cold front as it moved farther east into Jewell County between 8:30pm and 9pm CDT. Thunderstorm intensity increased between 9pm CDT and 9:30pm CDT, such that the wind gusts produced by the thunderstorms enhanced the already-high ambient synoptically driven non-thunderstorm wind gusts associated with the cold front. This resulted in additional 60 to 65 mph wind gusts across portions of Jewell County. No specific damage reports were received from this area. Wind gusts decreased as thunderstorms exited Jewell County by 10pm CDT.||As mentioned above, the damaging wind events in the eastern half of north central Kansas were largely driven by convective winds that enhanced already-high ambient winds. Farther west, the severe wind was non-convective and driven by intense pressure rises behind the cold front on the order of 3-5 mb per 2 hrs. This event was somewhat unique due to the narrow overlap, spatially and temporally, of both convective and non-convective damaging winds.

October 11, 2020

Severe wind gusts occurred with a line of thunderstorms across portions of south central Nebraska and north central Kansas on the evening of July 2nd. Fairly typical summertime weather pattern occurred on this day in which scattered thunderstorms developed over the High Plains during the late afternoon, posing a tornado and large hail threat, then organized into a quasi-linear convective system (QLCS) as they shifted eastward through the evening into an increasing moist, and unstable environment. As is often the case with QLCS events in this part of the country during this time of year, severe wind gusts were the primary threat. Thunderstorm mergers over extreme southwest Nebraska and northwest Kansas promoted the development of a significant pool of cold air which caused a segment of thunderstorms, within the broader line of thunderstorms, to quickly accelerate eastward into western portions of the County Warning Area (CWA) between 7-8pm CDT. By the time this activity arrived it already had a history of producing widespread 60-70mph wind gusts, and even isolated 70-80+mph wind gusts in the vicinity of Hill City, Kansas. The bowing line of thunderstorms continued to produce a swath of severe winds as it moved through the southern half (or so) of the CWA through the late evening hours. For north central Kansas, severe wind reports were most concentrated across areas south of Highway 36 and west of Highway 281. The strongest reported gust was 70mph in Plainville, Kansas. Damage to trees and power lines were the main impacts of the severe wind. The strongest thunderstorm cores, on the leading edge of the QLCS, exited the area to the southeast by around midnight. Trailing stratiform rain lingered for a couple more hours.||As mentioned above, the meteorological conditions were quite typical for this area for early July. A warm and moist air mass and steep mid level lapse rates supported very strong instability (MLCAPE 4000-5000 J/kg) across a large portion of the Central Plains. A broad upper level ridge axis was in place from the southern Plains into the Upper Mississippi River Valley, resulting in weak southwesterly flow aloft. Because of the upper ridging, deep layer wind shear was weak at less than 30 knots, with much of the shear owing to veering of wind direction in the low to mid levels. This indicates that primarily mesoscale features such as an MCV and a strong cold pool were the main factors that supported severe wind in this event, and not synoptic scale features. Downdraft CAPE values in excess of 1500 J/kg were indicative of the strong potential for cool pool development.

July 02, 2020