‘It Can Happen to You’: At Least 21 Vehicles Blown Over in Wyoming’s 105 mph Winds

The original story by Andrew Rossi for Cowboy State Daily.

Wyoming’s first big winter windstorm of the season packed a serious punch on Tuesday, flipping vehicles across the state and reminding drivers just how brutal the wind can be.

The Wyoming Highway Patrol says at least 21 vehicles were blown over on I-80, I-90 and I-25 during the storm, with wind gusts reported as high as 105 mph.

“So far, we’ve had 21 blowovers confirmed,” WHP spokesman Aaron Brown said. “Some sort of injury was reported in nine of those incidents, but there are no reports of serious injuries.”

Most of Wyoming’s busiest routes spent much of Tuesday and Wednesday under high-profile vehicle restrictions, especially for vehicles under 40,000 pounds gross weight. But those restrictions don’t mean the highway is fully closed.

Troopers don’t stop every truck to check weight. Instead, the responsibility — and risk — sits on the driver.

“Most truckers are required to keep track of their weight,” Brown said. “Our troopers aren’t going to pull over semi-trucks willy-nilly. The drivers are responsible for knowing their loads.”

One of the blowovers involved a semi that weighed 41,000 pounds, just over the 40,000-pound cutoff — a good reminder that even being “legal” doesn’t mean being safe in extreme wind.

Brown said many of the crashes happened during the closures, not before.

“A lot of blowovers are preventable,” he said. “It comes down to making safe, smart decisions and not trying to take these roads during these events.”

For drivers on I-25, the chaos was hard to miss.

Shauna Arbogast of Wheatland was headed to Colorado when she started seeing wreck after wreck.

“I saw two semis south of Cheyenne, a camper in Cheyenne, another camper north of Cheyenne, and two more between Wheatland and Cheyenne,” she said.

At one point, the Platte County Sheriff’s Office had drivers turning across the median to get around the mess. Arbogast said she watched at least one semi driver being helped toward an ambulance.

“I’m not sure if he was just shaken up or actually injured,” she said, “but someone was leading him by the arm.”

Further north, Justen Robinson and his wife watched a semi go over near Chugwater.

“I had my cruise control set at 82 mph and was barely overtaking him,” he said. “That was the second blowover I watched happen yesterday.”

Arbogast called many of the crashes “pointless accidents,” noting that I-25 had already been closed to high-profile vehicles for hours.

“Had people paid attention to the wind, none of them would have happened,” she said.

According to the National Weather Service in Cheyenne, gusts hit 76 mph near Bear Creek and up to 87 mph near Arlington along I-80. Elsewhere in southern Wyoming, winds topped out at 105 mph.

And it wasn’t just semis going over. Campers and RVs were hit hard too.

Brown pointed out that several closures applied not just to big rigs, but to lighter high-profile vehicles as well:

• I-25 north of Casper was closed to vehicles 20,000 pounds or less — which includes most RVs and campers.
• Between Cheyenne and Wheatland, the closure was for vehicles under 60,000 pounds.

Even low-profile passenger cars can get yanked around in that kind of wind.

“There were wind gusts of 105 mph yesterday,” Brown said. “That’s going to pull any car out of its lane.”

When a road is closed to certain vehicle weights, WHP treats it less like a suggestion and more like a line in the sand — especially if something goes wrong.

If a truck blows over and investigators find it was under the posted weight limit, the driver will be cited for being on the road when they shouldn’t have been.

“They need to be legally and rightfully driving,” Brown said. “That’s why it’s so important to know your load.”

But Brown says the message isn’t just for truckers. Every driver needs to take wind seriously.

“If the wind’s blowing your vehicle around, get to the nearest safe haven,” he said. “A rest area, a truck stop, a turnout — anywhere you can hunker down until the wind stops.”

If you see a semi getting pushed around, give it space.

“The smart decision is to give them space,” Brown said. “If you need to pass, pass very carefully. You don’t know what’s going to happen, or when it will.”

Meteorologists called Tuesday’s event a classic Wyoming “50-50 day” — the kind of high-wind setup that happens when warm and cold air are battling it out. Mild winter temperatures without wind, they say, are the real rarity.

“It’s when we’re between cold snaps and warmups that we have the worst winds,” Brown said.

For him, though, the label doesn’t really matter.

“Winter is the longest and, arguably, the most brutal season in Wyoming,” he said. “It’s not just wind. There are chances of sudden snow, sudden ice, and the weather taking a nasty turn at any time.”

His advice for the months ahead is simple: plan ahead, check conditions, and don’t underestimate the wind.

“Wherever you’re going, make sure you’re planning ahead,” Brown said. “Watch the forecast and be aware of your surroundings and road conditions. We’re in our winter period.”