High Wind — Wolfe, Kentucky

2022-03-31 · Wolfe, Kentucky

Event narrative

Pictures on social media showed roofing blown off of a small home near Hazel Green. Another picture showed roofing removed from a structure in the Lacy Creek area.

Wider weather episode

During the second half of March, precipitation across the region was generally minimal to nil, which allowed the forest litter and dead trees/branches to become very dry. This helped set the stage for a high fire danger situation as rapidly deepening low pressure passed to the west on March 30th. Strong southerly flow ahead of the system led to wind gusts of around 40 mph at many locations by early afternoon. In addition, a bubble of very warm and dry air over the Southeast US was pulled northward by the low-level jet and further dried due to downsloping effects off of the Great Smoky and Cumberland mountains. The combination of strong winds, very warm temperatures, dry fuels, and low relative humidities were very favorable for rapid fire spread and a number of small wildfires ended up breaking out across eastern Kentucky.

After a brief lull in the gusts during the evening of the 30th, the most intense winds with this storm system roared across eastern Kentucky from midnight to 4 AM on the 31st along and just ahead of a line of decaying showers moving in from the west. Wind gusts peaked in the 40 to 60 mph range across much of the forecast area during this time frame. Numerous power outages resulted, especially near/southwest of KY-15. Among the hardest hit was Owsley County, where over half the county lost power for a few hours overnight when the powerful winds blew a large tree down and damaged infrastructure near a substation. The winds also blew trees down onto power lines leading to downed lines and snapped power poles. A few instances of significant roof damage were also reported.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1007721. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.