Cowboy State Daily by Andrew Rossi 12/17/2025
Wyoming was hammered Wednesday by hurricane-force winds up to 123 mph. Highways closed, semis blew over, and forecasters are calling for more wind and higher than average temperatures heading into Christmas.And you thought last week's windstorm was intense.
The strongest wind gust recorded on Dec. 9 was 105 mph on the Chief Joseph Highway north of Cody.
The strongest wind recorded on Wednesday, as of 1 p.m., was 123 mph in Red Canyon near Lander. A 121-mph gust was recorded along the Salt River in Lincoln County that same morning.
"We had a sustained wind of 54 mph at Hunt Field Airport in Lander, with one brief gust of 92 mph," said meteorologist Lance VandenBoogart with the National Weather Service (NWS) office in Riverton. "That's pretty extreme for the Lander airport."
Once again, Wyoming's major highways were closed, in both directions, to all high-profile vehicles. Wyoming Highway 28 was closed to all vehicles due to "winter conditions."
"We have High Wind Warnings for basically the entire state," VandenBoogart said. "The few places that don't have a Winter Storm Warning instead, but that includes the threat of high winds."
Wyoming could actually consider itself lucky, by comparison. A wind gust of 142 mph was recorded at Coldwater Ridge, near Mount St. Helens in the southwest corner of Washington, and similarly-strong winds were recorded throughout the Pacific Northwest.
Unfortunately, these strong winds aren't the harbinger of snowstorms yet to come, and there could be more windstorms before the end of December.
"This is an even stronger system than last week's, and it's not done yet," VandenBoogart said
More:
https://cowboystatedaily.com/2025/12/17/wyoming-blasted-by-123-mph-winds-and-fierce-mountain-snowstorm/
