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The Winds Have Never Been This Bad

Dorcie Childs walks under two evergreen trees in his Colorado Springs, Colorado, front yard that were blown over in a wind storm.
Dorcie Childs walks under two evergreen trees in his Colorado Springs, Colorado, front yard that were blown over in a wind storm. Photo: Christian Murdock/The Gazette (AP)

The U.S. is no stranger to weather that comes with high winds, from tornadoes to hurricanes to California’s Santa Anas. But what happened on Wednesday is nothing short of historic.

The NWS Storm Prediction Center catalogs the gnarliest weather to hit the U.S., including reports of tornadoes, hail, and high winds. The center received 282 reports from weather stations in eight states for high winds. Among those reports are 55 stations that saw winds crack 75 mph (121 kmh). That sets a record for the most stations reporting winds that intense, one that was set during last August’s derecho. On the scale used to measure hurricanes, that means those stations saw gusts at least as high as a Category 1 storm. This type of storm’s wind profile is a bit different, so it’s not quite an apples-to-apples comparison, but you get the point. Winds bad! And frankly, the damage isn’t so far off from what hurricanes do to structures.

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