Life on the Great Plains can bring three certainties: death, taxes, and wind. The Great Plains are generally some of the windiest places in the United States. This is mostly down to its geography. The Rocky Mountains to the west allow wind to blow off the mountains and spill into the plains. To the north, Canadian air spills into the central US. Due to the flat, mostly tree-less expanse of the plains, nothing slows down the air. Therefore, the plains are a constant source of wind, and high wind too.
On any given day, the average wind speed over the plains is around 5-8 mph. There are days when it is much higher. However, it probably does not get much worse than the region experienced on January 17-18, 1996. A powerful low-pressure system and an arctic front sent hurricane-force winds across Nebraska and Iowa for over 24 hours. The result was something to behold and will be seen in this installment of This Week in Weather History.
THE SCIENCE BEHIND HIGH WIND
Wind is vital to our weather, it is the mover of air masses, if we had no wind, we would have no weather. The wind is generated between differences in air pressure. You can feel it if you ever open a door between two spaces of different pressure and feel that blast of air hit you, that is the air moving between the two rooms to find balance. However, nature will never find that balance because of uneven heating by the sun, the changing landscape of the Earth, and our movement around the sun.
Wide ranges in pressure cause high wind events. Case in point: January 18, 1996. A powerful low-pressure system was swinging through Kansas into Missouri. To the north, a powerful high-pressure was diving southward out of Canada. The difference between these pressure systems was great, and thus increased wind speeds. What is the location where the high winds would be? Nebraska and Iowa.
The storm system also drove downward an arctic front, which brought a huge blast of cold air. Cold air also came snow, creating a full-scale blizzard over the Cornhusker state.
THE STORM
At 6 pm on January 17, the temperature in Omaha was 53 degrees, balmy. However, the Arctic front was about to crash in. At the same time, temperatures in Norfolk were at 8. By 7 pm, the temperature had dropped to 40 in the city; 20 minutes later, it was down to 30; by 8 pm, it was 27. Finally, once the clock turned to midnight, Omaha was sitting at 8 degrees.
In central Nebraska, the force of the blizzard was felt. Snow fell, blown around by 60 mph winds, creating whiteout conditions. Motorists became stranded on the roads, and emergency crews went out to rescue people. I-80 was shut down from York to Grand Island. In Phelps County, 200 motorists were rescued and brought to public shelters. In Kearney, 300 students at the High School who remained for after-school activities were forced to stay the night in the school as it became too dangerous to go home.
In northeast Nebraska, the high wind caused damage. Windows were blown out of stores in Norfolk, and a livestock building was damaged. In Albion, the elementary school suffered damage. Across Cuming and Thurston Counties, winds estimated at 70 mph damaged grain bins, snapped trees and blew down fences. Power outages were common across central and northeast Nebraska, mostly in: Kearney, Grand Island, Columbus, and Norfolk.
In Omaha, wet roads from the rain swiftly turned to ice, causing many slide-offs. Road crews deployed sand mixture, mitigating some of the stress overnight. A semi slid off the road on I-80 near Hwy 370, temporarily closing the interstate for 15 minutes. The issues in the metro caused schools to close.
Yet, it was not the snow that captured attention, but the wind. As the arctic front continued to blast southward, the wind increased. For over 18 hours, winds were sustained between 25-40 mph with occasional gusts up to 60 mph. One eyewitness described it as feeling like a wintry tropical storm. The peak wind gust at Eppley Airfield was recorded as 63 mph, on the upper end of non-thunderstorm-related wind readings at the airport. Power outages were sporadic but frequent. OPPD had to answer 250-300 calls for small power outages during the day. On January 18, the average wind speed was 32.6 mph, making it the windiest day since record-keeping began at Eppley Airfield in the 1940s.
Alongside the wind was the bitter cold. For the entire day on the 18th, Omaha had temperatures close to 0. Compounding that with 50-60 mph winds, wind chill values frequently dropped below -30 the entire day. Cases of frostbite were not uncommon in area hospitals, and one man suffered from mild hypothermia.
By January 19, the storm system began to pull away, and the winds lightened. It remained cold, but overall conditions improved. Although not the largest in terms of numbers, only 1-3" of snow fell in most locations, the cold and wind turned it into a true Nebraska blizzard.
CODA: JANUARY 26, 1996
If the last blizzard did not come with any snow, a week later, snow did come on the 26th. A second storm system came through, and this time it brought moisture. A broad swath of eastern Nebraska into western Iowa experienced over 3" of snow. In the Omaha metro, amounts were between 6-8", and a stripe of 10"+ inches formed from Red Oak through Des Moines.
The snow brought chaos on the roads. At 190th and Dodge, a 15-car pileup closed the street for the entire day, though no one was seriously injured. Dozens of minor accidents across the Omaha metro brought the city to a close. In Montgomery County, Iowa, a three-car accident northeast of Red Oak sent nine people to the hospital (all recovered). Near Adair, Iowa, a 20-car pileup on I-80 brought a closure to the road. The snow also brought closures to many US highways over western Iowa.
By January 27, the snow was gone, just another memory to add to the brutal January of 1996.
