Thunderstorm Wind — Kent, Texas

2024-05-01 · near Jayton, Kent, Texas

Event narrative

A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Jayton measured severe wind gusts from 1953 CST through 1956 CST. A peak wind gust of 80 mph was measured at 1954 CST.

Wider weather episode

Numerous severe thunderstorms developed on the afternoon of the first in advance of a short wave trough moving across southern New Mexico and northern Chihuahua. A dryline initially positioned near the Texas/New Mexico state line early in the morning, mixed eastward through the day, settling along and just east of the Interstate 27/US Highway 87 corridor. Scattered thunderstorms initially developed along this dryline late in the afternoon where extremely high surface dew points in the upper 60s to lower 70s were observed. A strong elevated mixed layer existed above the moist low level air which allowed for explosive convective development once the cap was breached. Most unstable parcels were estimated in excess of 4000 Joules per kg of instability based off of rapid refresh model soundings. Severe wind and hail reports were observed from the southeastern Texas Panhandle through the central and southwestern South Plains. Low level winds significantly backed to the east in the extreme southeastern Texas Panhandle, ahead of a surface low, increasing low level wind shear beneath supercell thunderstorms. A few of these supercells were able to produce tornadoes but no known damage occurred with them due to the tornadoes remaining over open country. One supercell in particular produced a tornado, very large hail, and flash flooding in Hall County. This supercell became very slow moving once over western Hall County and produced an estimated 3-9 inches of rainfall. Much of this rainfall was over rural areas but did cause flash flooding near Farm to Market 657 near the Little Red River and Prairie Dog Town Fork Red River. Another supercell thunderstorm produced severe wind gusts in northwestern Crosby County, overturning irrigation center pivots. This storm produced an estimated three to four inches of rainfall in a short time period which caused flash flooding. Additionally, wake lows developed behind the departing convection which produced a couple of severe wind reports.

High wind gusts from the Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet network are below:

64 mph at South Plains (Floyd County) and

59 mph at Memphis (Hall County).

View location on OpenStreetMap → (33.2366, -100.5734)

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1166277. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.