Red Rock gust hits 75 mph; winds expected to diminish overnight
After a top gust of 75 mph at Red Rock, the Sunday dust storm appears to be diminishing, according to the National Weather Service.
“We’ll still see some strong gusts for the next few hours,” meteorologist Matt Woods said at 9:30 p.m. “But there will be much lighter winds overnight.”
The 75 mph gust at Red Rock came at 8:34 p.m., topping a 72 mph gust at 3:10 p.m. at Angel Peak.
There were scattered reports of downed trees and branches across the valley, Woods said.
1.5K without power
There were about 1,525 NV Energy customers without power near Lamb Boulevard and East Sahara Avenue as of 8:15 p.m. Sunday, but the cause of the outage was still being determined, according to the NV Energy outage website.
Winds of 30 to 40 mph with gusts to 65 mph were forecast until 11 p.m. when a high wind warning was set to expire.
A cold front is expected to move through the valley between 3 and 7 a.m. Monday, Woods said.
Life-threatening dust channel
Just before 4 p.m., trained weather spotters saw a “dust channel” in Goldfield moving east at 45 mph. Visibility was reported to be near zero and travel was deemed life-threatening on U.S. 95 between Lida Junction and Tonopah.
Damaging winds were in excess of 60 mph, the weather service said.
A dust channel, unlike a dust storm, can form rapidly and without warning.
Goldfield is about 155 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Contact Marvin Clemons at mclemons@reviewjournal.com or 702-863-4285. Follow @Marv_in_Vegas on Twitter.
