Thunderstorm Wind in Hale County, Texas

At 2030 CST, the Automated Weather Observing System at Hale County Municipal Airport measured a wind gust of 58 mph. Two minutes later at 2032 CST, a Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Plainview measured a severe wind gust of 85 mph.

Very hot temperatures and convergence within a surface trough allowed scattered thunderstorms to develop late in the afternoon on the 25th. The hot temperatures allowed storms to be high based producing mostly severe wind gusts. One of the more robust updrafts produced quarter size hail in the city of Lubbock. The most impressive storm of the evening was one that tracked near Slaton (Lubbock County). This storm generated a microburst with a peak wind gust of 110 mph measured by the Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet. A storm survey the next day revealed very localized damage around the mesonet site northeast of Slaton. Cotton crops were destroyed and mesquite trees were stripped. Additionally, irrigation pivots were damaged and partially rolled. A heavy gate damaged the fence surrounding the mesonet site but no damage to the sensors occurred. Later in the evening, a line of thunderstorms developed on an outflow boundary moving into the northwestern South Plains. These thunderstorms continued to produce intermittent severe wind gusts as they tracked across the northern South Plains into the extreme southeastern Texas Panhandle.