Chinook wind knocks down trees, scatters debris, disrupts military training exercise near Fort Greely
A week after a cold snap gripped the Interior, Chinook winds that exceeded 80 mph caused damage in areas Tuesday around Delta Junction and Denali. The southerly airflow also set or tied some daily high temperature records.
Delta City Administrator Ken Greenleaf says crews and equipment began clearing debris from some streets on Tuesday, when the winds were still howling, and then resumed work on Wednesday.
“Public works started early this morning going out and clearing roads – mostly just the tops of trees, that kind of thing,” Greenleaf said. “So, nothing huge.”
Fort Greely spokesperson Jim Verchio said Tuesday’s winds prompted post officials to close the Troop Store, commissary and post office, and some debris-littered streets and parking lots, mainly because they were concerned about material blowing off the exterior of the fitness center, especially one big chunk.
“It was probably a maybe 4-foot-by-20-foot piece of corrugated metal that flew off the building,” Verchio said.
The windstorm was even more intense at the Donnelly Training Area south of Fort Greely, where some 10,000 troops had converged to conduct a large-scale military exercise. That forced the 11th Airborne Division to reschedule helicopter-assault training. And Fort Wainwright spokesperson Eve Baker said winds tore up a couple of big tents where trainees were staying.
“Two large billeting tents were actually damaged in the Donnelly Training Area,” she said, “and approximately 150 soldiers had to be moved indoors to the physical readiness training facility on Fort Greely.”
Baker says gusts in the training area were clocked at about 65 miles an hour Tuesday. And National Weather Service meteorologist Skyler Twombly said farther to the south, at Isabel Pass, the chinook kicked-up 71 mile-an-hour gusts and sustained gale-force winds.
“It looks like it stayed over 50 (mph) the entire day,” he said.
But Twombly says the strongest winds in the eastern Interior Tuesday were recorded at a weather station at Antler Creek, just south of Healy off the Parks Highway.
“We had wind gusts up to 81.4 miles per hour, sustained at 62.1 miles per hour,” he said.
Denali Borough Mayor Chris Noel said he had to deal with that while trying to get home after sitting-in on an evening council meeting.
“It was just blowing like crazy,” he said, “and I actually drove home after the City of Anderson council meeting, and it was basically steadily blowing from Anderson all the way down to McKinley Village.”
Noel says he’s heard reports of downed trees and damaged buildings in the borough. And a Golden Valley Electric Association spokesperson said winds caused four brief power outages affecting only a few people in areas north of Healy and around Delta.
Twombly said Wednesday the chinook also brought warm air up from the south into the Interior. And that’s why Fort Greely set a new high-temperature record for Feb. 14th.
“They were up to 51.8 (degrees) at one point,” he said.
Twombly said that beat the old record of 46 degrees set back in 2017, and it’s well above the normal high temperature for the date of 16. He says Fairbanks tied its record high for the date of 41 degrees, also much warmer than the city’s usual high temperature of 11.
Twombly said winds around the Interior are forecast to die down by Friday morning and more seasonal weather will set in by the weekend.
