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Breezy Prediction

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Anonymous

Guest
Weather boys are saying it could get a little breezy in our country tomorrow..With a predicted high of 45 degrees it should really melt away what snow is left....I thought the 45 mph stuff today was bad enough- but 70 is getting pretty breezy......

URGENT - WEATHER MESSAGE
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE GLASGOW MT
900 PM MST THU DEC 14 2006

.A POWERFUL STORM SYSTEM IS PUSHING INTO THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST TONIGHT
AND WILL MOVE ACROSS NORTHEAST MONTANA FRIDAY AND FRIDAY NIGHT. VERY
STRONG WINDS ALOFT ARE EXPECTED TO REACH DOWN TO THE SURFACE...WHICH
COULD GENERATE WIND GUSTS AS HIGH AS 70 MPH.
THIS STORM HAS THE
POTENTIAL TO CAUSE DAMAGE AND TO MAKE ANY TRAVEL OR OUTDOOR
ACTIVITIES DANGEROUS FRIDAY AND FRIDAY NIGHT.
 

sic 'em reds

Well-known member
We got that weather report here in central WA on Wednesday. Today the air was real calm until we got hit about 3" of heavy wet snow.

Talk about a mess!!

Went out to feed the bred heifers and the poor girls have figured out when I am feeding! Had to turn a dog out to get them out away from the gate. They acted like they should be in the show barn!!!

This wet weather gets to be the pits when we get it around here. We're usually pretty dry (7-9" per year). The young fat girls get rylde up though. Now that they know where I'm coming from can become a pain, but the dogs will be able to have fun trailin the girls when I yell "bring 'em"

At this point I dont think I can say I'm trainin pups when the fat girls (bred heifers) know where they're going!!!!!???????!!!!!!

Oh well, everyone(dogs & me) needs some enjoyment out of this type of weather.
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
Judith said:
RUN OT!!!!!!! WE ARE UP TO 90 KMH AT THE MOMENT!!!!!! It's a comin your way!

:evil: :evil: Yeah thats what the weather boys said is that we could cuss Canadians again because they were letting all this nasty weather in....Maybe Judith you can send me a little whiff of that BC Bud along with the wind- no use in you hogging all the happy time... :wink:

Its hard to believe its coming with no wind all night- and not a breath of wind out there right now...
 

Shelly

Well-known member
We have the wind today, too. And then rain turning into snow, and then more snow with wind, and to top it all off, more wind with more snow!!!!
 

DJL

Well-known member
OT this is just payback for the North Dakota/Montana chinook you sent for us to enjoy last week! Brrrrr!!!!!
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
DJL said:
OT this is just payback for the North Dakota/Montana chinook you sent for us to enjoy last week! Brrrrr!!!!!

Yep- Probably-- I can't believe it-- its almost shirt sleeve weather out there right now--35 degrees and no wind....But looking on the computer, everwhere to the west is getting it-- 30 miles south of me on the Lake has 50 mph winds.....I hurried up and got everything fed-- figured they might be able to get filled up before the wind sends the rest to the folks east of me....
 

Faster horses

Well-known member
Very calm here as well, OT. I just checked our weather. Supposed
to get to 55 today and then 20-30 mph winds with gusts up to
40 and last through Saturday afternoon.

Guess if I was planning to go somewhere, I should have left
already and stayed away til Sunday! I think I missed the boat. :wink:
 

ranchwife

Well-known member
wind HOWLED here all night long, but Nothing compared to what you folks are predicted to get today, ot!!! bundle up, put the lead in your shoes and hunker down for the day!!!!!!

sic 'em reds-----how are you and yours doing today???????? Been watching the news and they are saying the northwest got HAMMERED with this last storm that came tearing through there!!! Got family in the portland/vancouver/camas/battleground area and have not had them return my calls yet!! :shock: :???:
 

ranchwife

Well-known member
Faster horses said:
We too have friends in the Battleground area, ranchwife.
Maybe we should be giving them a call!

:nod: :nod: :nod: :nod:
I still have not heard anything....gramma is diabetic and has a heart condition and my favorite cousin has twins less than a year old....keeping my fingers crossed and sending prayers to all out there!! :cry:
 

Judith

Well-known member
OT Buddy, I tried like the dickens to send some your direction but the darn wind kept putting the fire out! :shock: Just got our power back on a bit ago. This is the first year we have had so much trouble.
 

cowsense

Well-known member
70 MPH is just a little breeze down in DJL's country.........radio reports said the winds were gusting so hard they overturned half a dozen or so loaded semi's into the ditch! :shock: :shock:
 

DJL

Well-known member
Yes, a bunch of semis are now resting on their side in the ditch north of Ft. Macleod. The wind is starting to let up now that all the snow has been blown to parts unknown. At least the house isn't shaking anymore!
 

Mrs.Greg

Well-known member
Well I'm off to work this am,a tad nervous. The wind blew hard all night.We have sooo much snow,I couldn't hardly open the door to get outside to start my car,on top of that it also looks like it rained.Really looking forward to plowing through frozen snow drifts on hwy full of oil field trucks. :?

Have a nice day all :)
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
Take care there Mrs.Greg--I hope that snow stays up north with you folks tho-- weather boys are only predicting a slight chance so that means we'll probably get a blizzard :roll: ....

Didn't get the 70mph stuff yet-- altho down on the Missouri did...It is howling out there today tho with wind around 40 mph....Temp is dropping-- was 34 around 5AM-- is now down to 29.....
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
Yep- definitely getting a little breezy out-- Wind is gusting around 50 mph here right now...I just got back from loading a load of calves out at the feedlot- and wasn't sure if it wouldn't blow me off the roads that are slick from the drifting little bit of snow we got last night....Sure glad I'm not driving the semi thats headed to Minnesota :roll:

But after reading this article in todays Gazette I guess I have nothing to complain about........

______________________________________________________

Wind record broken
By ERIC NEWHOUSE and MIKE BABCOCK Tribune Staff Editors


Montana's wind record was blown away this week.

A wind gauge on Snowslip Mountain, just east of the Continental Divide along Highway 2, clocked a gust of 164 mph Wednesday.



That's akin to a hurricane. A category 5 storm carries sustained winds of more than 155 mph.

And it blew away the old state record of 143 mph, set at the Miller Colony just north of Choteau in 2002.

At Logan Pass on Wednesday, winds gusted to 133 mph, according to the National Weather Service.

Friday's winds were not quite as strong — 84 mph in Cut Bank and 80 in Great Falls — but still strong enough blow a truck off the highway and halt the Amtrak trains.

The storm knocked out electrical power in much of western and central Montana. Students gathered in the field house at Great Falls High to wait for the lights to come on in their classrooms, Northwestern

Energy crews scrambled to replace broken off utility poles, and power was still out in some parts of the state.

"Early this morning, we had a frontal boundary pass through with some incredible wind speeds," said Jerome Saucier, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Great Falls.

It was a fast moving shot of high winds, heavy rain, some ice pellets and a stroke of lightning or two," he said. "It was quite unstable and pushing through very fast."

Near the wind farm at Harlowton, a semi was blown over early this morning, according to a dispatcher for the Montana Highway Patrol.

The National Weather Service reported sustained winds of 44 mph with gusts up to 52 in Great Falls on Friday, but KRTV clocked an 80 mph wind gust.

"Trucks are moving today, but very slowly," said Randy Roth of the Flying J Truck Stop.

"However, there are a lot of campers who just said the heck with it — we're staying put," he added.

One of Montana's windier spots Friday was Cut Bank, where sustained winds were 63 mph and gusts hit 84.

"We've had lots of trees down in yards, and a lot of street signs and road signs are down, too," said Glacier County Sheriff's Dispatcher Lana Leishman.

"And I know there are a lot of Christmas decorations that have been blown away," she added.

One elderly woman was blown over, banged her head, and was taken by ambulance to the Cut Bank hospital, she said.

"And another elderly gentleman in Browning was blown down and couldn't get back up," said Leishman. "We had to call tribal law enforcement to help him.

"But it got rid of all the ice on our roads," she added.

At the Isaac Walton Inn in Essex, staff was still waiting for the morning Amtrak at mid-afternoon.

"They had to stop all the trains on the east side of the Divide because of the wind," said Sara Hudson.

An Amtrak spokesman in Shelby confirmed the morning train was running four to five hours late Friday, while the afternoon train was an hour or two behind schedule.

Wind gusted up to 85 mph at McDonald Pass, 82 mph in Livingston, 70 mph at both Two Medicine and Heart Butte and 74 mph in Browning, Saucier said.

Northwestern Energy spokesman Tom Glanzer said the storm in Montana reached from the western edge of the state to Great Falls, south through Helena, Deer Lodge, Butte and Anaconda and north to the Havre-Chester area.

In all, Northwestern Energy received 3,700 calls from customers reporting power outages or utility poles on the ground. The bulk of the calls were in Missoula, Hamilton, Anaconda, Deer Lodge, Helena and Great Falls.

As of late afternoon Friday, scattered power outages continued in the Havre, Chester and Dutton areas. Power outages also were reported in the Belt, Valier and Dutton areas.

In the Great Falls area, about 1,250 customers were without service for more than two hours and 13 utility poles in northcentral Montana went down.

Outages continued until late afternoon in the East Helena, White Sulphur Springs and Lincoln areas.

Glanzer said Northwestern has a mutual service agreement with most electric utilities serving the western United States, and the company has been asked to help restore power in the Vancouver, Wash., area.

"They are looking for help too, but it hit us at a rough time," Glanzer said. "If we feel we are solid in our Montana operations, we could run crews over to that area. The whole northwest part of the nation needs help right now."

Most of the outages occurred about 5:30 a.m. on Friday but another round of outages came along at about 8:45 a.m. Glanzer said the interruptions in electrical service all are weather related and were caused by wind, rain or snow. He was unable to say how many customers were affected.

Power went off in central Great Falls about 5:40 a.m. so lights were out at Great Falls High, Paris Gibson, Lincoln and Holy Spirit schools.

When students began arriving before dawn at Great Falls High, they were ushered to the field house on the south campus, where there was electricity.

Dick Kuntz, the assistant superintendent of Great Falls schools, said teachers and their students remained there until it was light enough to use classrooms.

"As the kids arrived, we tried to get them into a safe environment. We got them into the bleachers so we could supervise them and make sure they were safe. Our contacts at the power company kept telling us it would be up in a half hour.

"We didn't get power restored until about 11 a.m. so we basically sheltered the kids, tried to keep them safe for the first three hours. By that time, it was lunch, and we got all the kids and staff fed by 11:45 a.m., and then we had regular schedule the rest of the day."

Kuntz cited two reasons for not sending the high school students home: "First and foremost is safety. We feel they are safe at school. We had no way to contact parents and no way to escort kids who didn't drive. Secondly, the power company kept assuring us it would be half an hour."

"It takes a lot for us to close schools," said Superintendent Bryan Dunn. "Once school starts, to send home means that many will go home to empty houses, front and back doors that are locked and to unsupervised homes. We think it is better to keep them at school, even if there is a problem, where it is safer than to be on the streets.

"It would take a lot for us to send them home," he said. "The school itself would have to be unsafe."

As soon as power was restored, all of the schools security systems and alarm systems powered up and the alarms went off.

"We had lots of bells to signify that the power was back on. We got those settled and got communications with the staff. We had a few parents who came and got their kids but the vast majority stayed here, and we tried to get on the best we could."

Kuntz said it would take several days before the absenteeism figures are computed since teachers took roll by paper and pencil. In all, 1,800 students attend Great Falls High.

"You kind of get through it and wait for the power to come on but 1,800 kids without instruction makes for a long morning," Kuntz said.

While traffic signals were dead for several blocks along 10th Avenue South, police reported no problems with traffic.

Great Falls Police Sgt. John Schaffer, said there were no problems with 10th Avenue South.

"I haven't heard of any other problems that have caused us any major issues," Schaffer said.
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
For some of you further east of us getting the gales we had- there is hope...I awoke this morning to an unfamiliar sound- stillness...You could actually hear yourself think without a background noise of howling wind :lol:

Cleared off and cooled down- Was about 7 at 5AM-- now up to 11...
 

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