An approaching short wave aloft along with increasing low level moisture allowed scattered thunderstorms to develop on the afternoon into the evening of the 16th across eastern New Mexico. This activity developed eastward, organizing into a ragged line of high based thunderstorms as it moved across the South Plains, then into the Rolling Plains during the evening and overnight hours.
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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 LUB wrote it up.
An approaching short wave aloft along with increasing low level moisture allowed scattered thunderstorms to develop on the afternoon into the evening of the 16th across eastern New Mexico. This activity developed eastward, organizing into a ragged line of high based thunderstorms as it moved across the South Plains, then into the Rolling Plains during the evening and overnight hours. These thunderstorms produced widespread strong to severe winds as they accelerated eastward, along with blowing dust.
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 Lubbock, TX wrote its last area forecast discussion before the first event at May 16, 5:30 PM CST, 1 hour 12 minutes earlier.
Area Forecast Discussion National Weather Service Lubbock TX 630 PM CDT Mon May 16 2022 .AVIATION... Continued VFR outside of TS. Area of TS from near Dora, NM southeast to Seminole continues to be the concern through 11 PM or so from LBB to PVW. This convection will likely pose a risk for strong winds and low visbys in blowing dust, although some hail is also possible at times. Uncertainty increases a bit toward CDS as this initial round of storms may falter, although additional activity is likely at some point tonight. Convection should clear the terminals from W-E overnight with gusty S-SW winds by mid- morning. Outside chance exists for spotty TS by late Tuesday afternoon near CDS, but confidence in this is too low for any further mention. && .PREV DISCUSSION... /issued 221 PM CDT Mon May 16 2022/ SHORT TERM... A well defined short wave on water vapor imagery was moving away from the four-corners region this afternoon. This short wave will continue to weaken as it moves eastward through the rest of the afternoon into the evening. At the same time, an upper level ridge to our southwest will be expanding overhead. The combination of the short wave and ridge battling will be nearly neutral height changes this evening. A couple of weak jet maxes around 50-60kt at 250mb or so will affect the area. One of these is associated with the short wave while the other is moving around the upper ridge to the southwest. The combination of these will allow weak upper level divergence to spread overhead the rest of this afternoon and evening. Closer to the surface, broad east to southeasterly upslope flow will continue as a warm front moves back north today. Therefore, no strong surface convergence is evident in the near surface wind fields. The boundary layer is slow to mix out this afternoon after higher surface dew points than expected. Although, this may prove detrimental to convective chances this evening. This may add to the convective inhibition being slower to erode or not erode at all. Areas near the Texas/New Mexico state line stand the best chance of becoming uncapped late this afternoon with increasing CIN to the east. Extremely steep mid level lapse rates exist overhead with values on the order of 8.5-9 C/km. With deeply mixed parcels, this will yield around 1500 J/kg of instability. However, it will also generate about 1000-1500 J/kg of DCAPE. Additionally, cloud layer flow is not impressive for May standards. High based storms with severe outflow gusts is the most likely scenario from convection late this afternoon through the evening. On Tuesday, another short wave will approach from the west. However, convective chances will be much lower. Surface cyclogenesis in southeastern Colorado moving into the Oklahoma panhandle will lead to broad south to southwest low level flow. The dryline will be well east of the area just west of the I-35 corridor leaving much drier air in the region. In fact, most of the atmosphere will be dry with the exception of a little mid level moisture. So, even though we will have some lift over the area, it will be mostly lifting dry air. LONG TERM... Upper flow will generally weaken and become more zonal by midweek as low amplitude upper troughing meanders over the Desert Southwest. A weakening cold front will push southward through the TX Panhandle early Wednesday, but with little in the way of sensible weather impacts besides a modest increase in low level moisture as hot temperatures return during the afternoon. Guidance suggests a weak impulse aloft may result in thunderstorm formation off the high terrain in SE Colorado Wednesday evening which may drift into the TX Panhandle overnight. Steering flow is weak and lacks a strong northerly component and therefore this activity is expected to remain north of our area, though we can't quite rule out a few isolated cells infringing on the extreme southern Panhandle during the late evening. The heat ramps up even more on Thursday as southwesterly surface flow increases in response to strong surface cyclogenesis over eastern Colorado. This will drive afternoon highs into the upper 90s to mid 100s and bring a return of elevated to potentially critical fire weather conditions across much of the region. The upper level flow pattern will begin to amplify on Friday as deeper upper troughing overspreads much of the NW US. This will mark the beginning of a period of slightly stronger zonal flow aloft which is set to last through the weekend as a series of disturbances passes by well to our north. At the surface, a cold front will exit from the TX Panhandle into the South Plains on Friday morning, though the southward progression of the front during the morning remains uncertain and thus complicates Friday's high temperature forecast. At this time, it appears surface troughing over eastern NM and associated westerly flow will be sufficient to allow afternoon temperatures to warm back into the 90s. A significantly stronger front will surge southward through the region Friday night, bringing a notable cool-down just in time for the weekend. Temperatures on Saturday morning are expected to fall into the upper 40s to lower 50s with pleasant daytime highs in the 70s and lower 80s expected both Saturday and Sunday. Forecast uncertainty increases heading into next week, though ensemble guidance hints at a potential return of better low level moisture and low precip chances early next week. /DWK FIRE WEATHER... Widespread elevated to near-critical fire weather conditions are expected on Tuesday afternoon. A dryline will move well east of the region leaving relatively dry air over the South Plains and Rolling Plains. Temperatures will warm again to near record values and with the dry air in place, will lead to afternoon relative humidity values in the single digits. Winds will be strongest in the Rolling Plains with 20 foot speeds 20-25 mph and 15-20 mph on the Caprock. There is some uncertainty, however, with areas that could see rainfall this evening which may limit fire weather potential on Tuesday. There is a very small chance of isolated dry thunderstorms to develop on Tuesday afternoon as well as an upper level disturbance approaches the region. Elevated to potentially critical fire weather conditions will are expected over much of the region again on Thursday as hot and breezy weather returns. && .LUB WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES... Fire Weather Watch from Tuesday morning through Tuesday evening for TXZ021>044. && 99/99/93
Hazardous Weather Outlook...UPDATED National Weather Service Lubbock TX 616 PM CDT Mon May 16 2022 TXZ021>044-172330- Parmer-Castro-Swisher-Briscoe-Hall-Childress-Bailey-Lamb-Hale-Floyd- Motley-Cottle-Cochran-Hockley-Lubbock-Crosby-Dickens-King-Yoakum- Terry-Lynn-Garza-Kent-Stonewall- 616 PM CDT Mon May 16 2022 This Hazardous Weather Outlook is for the South Plains, Rolling Plains, and the far Southern Texas Panhandle. .DAY ONE...Tonight. A Severe Thunderstorm Watch is in effect for much of the South Plains, far southern Texas Panhandle and adjacent portions of the northern Rolling Plains until 1 AM. Scattered strong to severe thunderstorms are expected to form in eastern New Mexico or along the state line this evening and move east across the area tonight. The highest probabilities for severe weather will be over the southern Panhandle and northern South Plains where damaging wind gusts up to 70 mph along with a few instances of very large hail up to tennis ball size possible. .DAYS TWO THROUGH SEVEN...Tuesday through Sunday. Elevated to critical fire weather conditions will be possible on the Caprock and across the Rolling Plains on Tuesday and again on Thursday. A Fire Weather Watch is in effect for the entire area from 10 AM to 9 PM CDT on Tuesday. .SPOTTER INFORMATION STATEMENT... Spotter activation may be needed.
The Lubbock radar (KLBB), 76 km away, was scanning. The volume nearest the first event began at 00:42 UTC.
11 thunderstorm wind, 1 hail. Local standard time, as filed.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near O'Donnell measured severe wind gusts at 1842 CST and again at 1904 CST. A peak gust of 60 mph was measured at 1904 CST.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near New Home measured severe wind gusts from 1908 CST through 1913 CST. A peak wind gust of 70 mph was measured at 1911 CST.
An off-duty NWS employee measured quarter size hail south of Wolfforth.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Slaton measured severe wind gusts from 1930 CST through 1935 CST. A peak gust of 68 mph was measured at 1933 CST. Additionally, the Automated Surface Observing System (ASOS) at Lubbock Preston Smith International Airport measured a gust to 58 mph at 1931 CST. The emergency manager for the city of Lubbock also reported downed power poles in the 5700 block of third street in Lubbock.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Ralls measured a severe wind gust of 65 mph.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near White River Lake measured severe wind gusts from 2015 CST through 2022 CST. A peak wind gust of 66 mph was measured at 2016 CST.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near McAdoo measured severe wind gusts from 2019 CST through 2027 CST. A peak wind gust of 65 mph was measured at 2020 CST.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Post measured a wind gust of 60 mph.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Roaring Springs measured a wind gust of 62 mph.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Guthrie measured a wind gust of 60 mph.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Northfield measured severe wind gusts from 2119 CST through 2121 CST. A peak wind gust of 61 mph was measured at 2120 CST.
A Texas Tech University West Texas mesonet site near Hackberry measured a wind gust of 58 mph.
After NWS Directive 10-1605, the rules offices file Storm Data by.
Every storm in Texas in 2022Every state in 2022This day in weather historyWarnings in Texas, May 2022
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: 1017990, 1017989, 1017991, 1017992, 1017993, 1017994, 1017996, 1017997, 1018000, 1018001, 1018002, 1018003.