Winter Storm — Centennial Mountains-island Park, Idaho

2022-12-20 to 2022-12-23 · Centennial Mountains-island Park, Idaho

Event narrative

Extreme winds caused widespread blowing and drifting snow with extensive road closures. US Highway 20 was closed from Ashton to the Montana state line. State Highway 87 was closed from US 20 to the Montana state line. Fremont County School District 215 was closed on the 21st due to the road conditions. Wind chill readings of -50 to -60 were recorded on the 22nd and 23d after the arctic frontal passage.

Wider weather episode

An extremely strong Pacific cold front brought wind gusts in the 50 to 80 mph range with localized blizzard conditions in the mountains and then extremely cold wind chills followed behind an arctic cold frontal passage. Snow amounts in the mountains were generally light and mainly in the 1 to 5 inch range but the combination with the wind brought many road closures to extreme eastern Idaho on the 21st into the 22nd. Some school closures occurred on the 21st and 22nd.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1071762. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.