March madness hit West Texas with an angry punch Monday, March 14, as wind gusts reached damaging speeds of 80+ miles per hour, primarily across the Caprock. The record-breaking wind speeds caused property damage, grass fires, fatal vehicle accidents and power outages across New Mexico, the Texas Panhandle and Oklahoma.
Xcel Energy, an electrical power company that serves a large portion of the region, was announcing days beforehand a possibility of scheduled power outages ahead of the wind to prevent sparking any wildfires. Dickens County Emergency Management and the Spur Volunteer Fire Department shared the information widely ahead of the wind event.
The wind and blowing dust caused widespread power grid damage to the counties north and west of Dickens County, leaving 68,000 Xcel customers without power. As of 7:00 p.m. Central time, Xcel announced that 90% of the outages had been restored, and only 4,500 customers remained without power. With 450 employees and contractors deployed from as far as Colorado, every effort was made to expedite the repairs, including the utilization of helicopters and drones for inspections after the winds died down. Some areas sustained significant damageandweren’t expected to have power restored until Monday.
The Texas Department of Public Safety announced that troopers had investigated 42 crashes across the Amarillo district on Monday, including four fatalities. The biggest crash happened on I-27 between Happy and Canyon, where dust blowing across the road resulted in zero visibility, causing a pileup of an estimated 38 vehicles. DPS reported that most of the accidents involved multiple vehicles.
Property damage was extensive in the area north of Dickens County, including large broken tree limbs, entire trees blown over, multiple metal roofs blown off and broken windows. No similar damage in Dickens or Kent County was reported to The Texas Spur.
U-Haul announced the company’s two Amarillo locations as well as the Lubbock location will be offering 30 days of free storage to those affected by the damaging windstorms.
