On Thursday, the city of Cortez experienced high wind gusts, resulting in multiple broken tree limbs across town.
The city received reports of broken limbs near at Maple and Third streets, according to Don Cornett, and crews responded first thing Friday morning to clean up the debris.
A Journal reporter found broken limbs in front lawns on Madison and Arbecam streets, north of Montezuma Avenue. Canopy Tree Specialists were raking branches on a lawn on Madison Street Friday morning.
Power lines were not affected, and no power outages occurred in Cortez because of the wind, Empire Electric said. There were power outages related to routine maintenance in the area.
The Journal reached out to Jim Andrus, local weather spotter in Cortez, to learn more about what caused the winds. Andrus didn’t witness the gusts, but his best guess was a microburst had occurred, and it was a localized event.
Microbursts most often occur during a thunderstorm, when the center of the storm clouds collapse, sending a column of air to the ground, Andrus said. The air column hits the ground and spreads out in all directions, causing high wind speeds for a short period of time.
There was no thunderstorm in the area Thursday afternoon, so Andrus estimated that a towering cumulus cloud could have collapsed, having a similar effect. According to the Weather Underground website, radars showed the gusts to reach 36 mph, with wind speeds of 24 mph just before 5 p.m. Thursday, with temperatures of 93 degrees Fahrenheit.
Andrus agreed that this was a unique event, and added that broken tree limbs would face away from the center of the weather event, helping to pinpoint where the column of air struck the ground.
