A cold front passing through the Mojave Desert brought a band of thunderstorms well ahead of it, and strong winds with dust storm conditions immediately ahead of it.
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Deaths and injuries are direct and indirect together, as the offices filed them. Damage is property and crops in the dollars of the year, not adjusted for inflation, and only where an office estimated it.
The episode as NWS VEF wrote it up.
A cold front passing through the Mojave Desert brought a band of thunderstorms well ahead of it, and strong winds with dust storm conditions immediately ahead of it.
The local office's own words before the first event, as it sent them, from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's archive of National Weather Service text.
NWS Las Vegas, NV wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at Sep 22, 1:42 PM PST, 40 minutes earlier.
Area Forecast Discussion...Corrected National Weather Service Las Vegas NV 242 PM PDT THU SEP 22 2016 .SYNOPSIS...A strong trough moving through the region will bring widespread strong winds and enhanced fire danger to the region through this evening. Showers and thunderstorms with heavy rainfall will be possible across mainly northwest Arizona as well. Below average temperatures are expected through the weekend, warming to near average early next week, with drier and calmer conditions anticipated. && .SHORT TERM...through tonight. WV imagery showing deep trough/upper low continuing to dig southeastward into the Great Basin this afternoon. Jet streak is approaching the base of the trough, with substantial difluence/divergence in eastern Nevada, Utah, and northern Arizona in favorable left front quadrant region. Substantial large-scale lift from differential cyclonic vorticity advection has reached the more unstable warm sector of far eastern Nevada SSE to western Arizona, and more intense updrafts have recently developed in Lincoln County southward to Lake Mead. High-resolution guidance is consistently showing a band or bands of storms developing in this general area moving eastward into southwest Utah and northern Mohave County over the next several hours. Environmental parameters remain favorable for storm organization, with effective bulk shear 30-40 kts and MUCAPE 500-1000 J/kg sufficient for isolated severe storms capable of producing damaging wind gusts. Though potential for hail exists, think the general weakness of the updrafts will not support a more widespread threat. Storm motions will be fast with such midlevel steering winds in place, but if sustained updrafts can develop in small bands or lines, training thunderstorms with efficient rain rates will be capable of producing localized flash flooding, especially with antecedent rains in northern Mohave County the last couple of days. Flash flood watch remains in effect for this area this evening. Winds look to remain strong as the trough axis approaches the area this evening, but a cold front sweeping through the southern Great Basin at this time will generate a switchover to northwest winds with speeds decreasing rapidly thereafter. Dust has been kicked up across the Mojave Desert this afternoon, with reduced visibilities reported along I-15 from Baker to Barstow. Expect blowing dust to remain a concern through sunset in this region before gradual improvement with lowered wind speeds thereafter. Current wind/dust products look good and did not change with the afternoon package. Red flag conditions are being met across much of the area this afternoon as well. See the fire weather discussion for more information. Sharply cooler temperatures are expected tonight as colder air behind the front seeps into the region. Expect temps anywhere from 7- 15 degrees colder than those observed last night. .LONG TERM...Friday through Thursday. A final shortwave over southern Nevada will be moving through the base of the vigorous trough early Friday morning. This will allow the upper trough to start moving eastward into the Four Corner States by late Friday afternoon. On backside of trough, temperatures will be much cooler Friday (around 10 degrees below normal) along with lingering north breezes. Over the weekend, southern extent of upper trough stalls over the southern Rockies as strong high pressure begins to build in across California/western Nevada. Daytime temperatures quickly rebound back to near normal Sunday. A developing north/south surface pressure gradient will help enhance north/northeast surface winds, especially within the Colorado River Valley south of Hoover Dam both days. More uncertainty next week as models continue to struggle with handling of southern stream energy pinching off over New Mexico. Quite a bit of flip-flopping between operational ECMWF/GFS runs as just last night's solutions had back away from any energy retrograding westward across Arizona/northwest Mexico. Based on the strength of the ridge over California and the Great Basin, it is plausible. For now, keeping the area dry with temperatures hovering around normal. && .AVIATION...For McCarran...Southwest winds 20-30 kts with gusts to 40 kts will be likely through the afternoon. Forecast confidence is low on the exact influence of a cold front later this afternoon on winds at McCarran. Some forecast computer models are suggesting winds will struggle to become northwesterly and settle in a more westerly direction while others push through the front and bring northwest wind overnight. For now, the TAF will hint at a slight NW direction at 03z with a more gradual shift to NW overnight as winds subside. A plausible alternative to the official forecast is that we will see a sudden shift to the NW (~330) with strong gusty winds at around 03z. This should be considered in any planning during this period of time. Mechanical turbulence and low level wind shear will also remain a problem for the rest of the afternoon. For the rest of southern Nevada...northwest Arizona...and southeast California...Chances of showers/storms confined to Mohave and Lincoln Counties today with strong west to southwest winds the main concern elsewhere. Cold front will move through the southern Great Basin and Inyo County this afternoon/evening with switchover to northwest directions during/after passage. Winds should diminish after sunset, but may be slower to occur in the Mojave Desert. VFR conditions outside of storms. Mechanical turbulence and mountain wave activity is anticipated through this evening. && .FIRE WEATHER...Much drier air has arrived with relative humidity values plummeting into the single digits along with strong southwest to west winds. Winds will start to weaken by late evening as relative humidity values recover above 15 percent overnight as temperatures cool. North to northeast breezes will continue at times Friday through Sunday as high pressure builds in across California and the Great Basin. Temperatures will be well below Friday but will warm through the weekend. && .SPOTTER INFORMATION STATEMENT...Spotters in northwest Arizona are encouraged to report severe weather or flooding. Spotters elsewhere can report significant weather (especially blowing dust, wind damage, or fire starts) according to standard operating procedures. && Short Term: Shafer Long Term/Fire Weather: Pierce Aviation: Lericos For more forecast information...see us on our webpage: http://weather.gov/lasvegas or follow us on Facebook and Twitter
PRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE LAS VEGAS NV
136 PM PDT THU SEP 22 2016
..TIME... ...EVENT... ...CITY LOCATION... ...LAT.LON...
..DATE... ....MAG.... ..COUNTY LOCATION..ST.. ...SOURCE....
..REMARKS..
1245 PM NON-TSTM WND GST 1 NNE HENDERSON 36.06N 114.97W
09/22/2016 M58 MPH CLARK NV MESONET
OBSERVATION NEAR CENTRAL PARK IN HENDERSON.
&&
CMSPRELIMINARY LOCAL STORM REPORT
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE LAS VEGAS NV
137 PM PDT THU SEP 22 2016
..TIME... ...EVENT... ...CITY LOCATION... ...LAT.LON...
..DATE... ....MAG.... ..COUNTY LOCATION..ST.. ...SOURCE....
..REMARKS..
1250 PM NON-TSTM WND GST 3 ENE MT. CHARLESTON 36.27N 115.60W
09/22/2016 M60 MPH CLARK NV MESONET
MESONET STATION MT. CHARLESTON 1 SE /KYCN2/.
&&
CMSThe national radar mosaic for the moment the first event began.
2 dust storm. Local standard time, as filed.
Visibility was reduced to a quarter mile or less at the Bicycle Lake (KBYS) AWOS on Fort Irwin, as well as on Highway 58 west of Barstow. The peak wind gust was 67 mph, measured at KBYS.
Dust storm conditions reduced visibility to a quarter mile at the Twentynine Palms (KNXP) ASOS.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in California in 2016Every state in 2016This day in weather historyWarnings in California, September 2016
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database, compiled from the National Weather Service’s monthly Storm Data. Complete through 2026-06; NCEI adds each month about 75 days after it ends and revises past years a few times a year. Rebuilt 2026-09-24. Each event’s entry at NCEI: 655165, 655166.