File photo High winds knocked out power and caused damage Tuesday, Nov. 17, most of which was downed trees such as this one that also took out a sign at the Zip's restaurant in Cheney.
Record high winds ravaged most of Eastern Washington on Nov. 17, causing two deaths - including a Cheney woman - knocking down fences and trees, tearing off roofs and leaving thousands without power, some for weeks.
Carolyn Marie Wilford, 70, died when her car was struck by a falling tree as she drove home on State Route 904 near Four Lakes. A woman was also killed on Spokane's South Hill.
Reports indicated an estimated 200,000 customers of various area utilities were out of power during the height of the storm.
Locally, power was knocked out in north Cheney and the Fish Lake area about mid-afternoon, with the entire city going dark just after 5:30 p.m. - leaving all of the nearly 5,600 Cheney Light customers without power.
"Every meter was out," Light Department Director Steve Boorman said.
Even the Cheney Free Press had to delay publication a day for the first time in memory.
Most of the city was back up Wednesday, Nov. 18. Boorman praised the work of the Light Department crew for their response to the storm. The city annually clears power line right of ways of any trees, branches or brush that might fall and cut power.
"Our crews did a great job," he said. "A significant chunk of that (power outage) was transmission, which was out of our control."
The storm brought sustained winds between 30 - 40 miles per hour, if not higher, along with some pretty intense gusts. The highest gust, according to the National Weather Service, was 137 mph at Mission Ridge Ski area near Wenatchee, which occurred at 6 p.m.
According to Eastern Washington University meteorology professor Dr. Bob Quinn, the wind event was very much record setting.
"They put out some warnings and basically knew up to 72 hours prior that we were going to get a spectacular wind event," Quinn said. As it turned out what was forecasted was right on with hurricane force and winds that did exceed 70 miles-per-hour.
"Even though that's not the record for the Weather Service (at Spokane) it really is," Quinn said. In the past, thunderstorm gusts, which are highly localized, were slightly faster, he said. "As far as sustained winds, this was it," Quinn said.
Spokane International Airport and Fairchild Air Force base each recorded gusts of 71 mph, the former at 3:53 p.m. and the latter at 6:03 p.m. Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge reported a 56 mph gust at 5:28 p.m.
The storm proved to be statistically stronger than the 1962 Columbus Day storm that ravaged the Northwest, specifically the Pacific Coast. The remnants of Typhoon Freda registered at 995.7 millibars while the Nov. 17 storm was slightly lower with a reading of 993.9.
Safe to say, "It's the strongest event we've had since the National Weather Service has had good instrumentation," Quinn said. That started in the 1940s.
"It's the strongest event in the 75 years of reasonably accurate records," he said. Based on historical data, Quinn said it was probably the strongest event in the last century, that being based purely on anecdotal records.
John McCallum can be reached at [email protected]. Paul Delaney contributed to this story.
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