Weather History

This Day In Weather History

In 2021, the most powerful arctic air mass in a generation steamrolled into the Central and Southern Plains to ruin the valentines day plans.  Temperatures across Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Texas cratered causing 100 record cold temperatures to fall.  Eisenhower Airport and Chanute Airports both set new records of 7 below zero and 2 below zero respectively.  Both of these temperatures replaced records that had stood for 85 years. The arctic air was so powerful, it broke many 100 year old records across the Central and Southern Plain.  Snow fell in Houston, Galveston, Corpus Christi and even Brownsville.  Central Texas took a beat down from this weather with a crippling ice storm in addition to the cold air.  The arctic air, ice storm and snow resulted in downed power lines while extremely high electrical demand caused more than 20 million people to be without power.  Rolling blackouts were utilized to keep what was left of the electrical grid stable.  This also resulted in many communities to suffer broken water pipes in homes and businesses causing massive damage with Austin and San Antonio Texas to require residents to boil water.  Total damage across Texas and the other Gulf Coast States was estimated at 195 billion dollars.  Sadly, the extreme cold and winter weather claimed 80 lives in the United States and 12 lives in Northern Mexico.

&&

In 1987, a extremely powerful winter storm spawned severe thunderstorms in Texas and Oklahoma, while heavy snow buried much of the Rocky Mountains. Telluride, Colorado received 27 inches of snow. Gusts at 104 mph were measured through Guadalupe Pass in West Texas.
This Day in Weather History Archive