Amarillo Wind, Weather and Ground Data for Crane Lifts

Last reviewed 2026-10-13. Journalists, researchers, and community groups are welcome to cite any figure on this page with attribution and a link.

Amarillo's wind averages 13.6 mph over the year, with southwest the year's prevailing direction (south from May through September), by the normals for 1991-2020 that the National Weather Service publishes, and its lowest month, August, still averages 12.0 mph. The NWS Amarillo office's own study of daily average speeds from 2004 through 2025 puts it plainly: "it's windy in Amarillo all year." This page sets out those normals month by month, the temperature, rain and snow figures, the severe weather and gust records, and the soils a crane stands on, each from the agency that publishes it, with the station or source and the period on every table. The last section turns the numbers into the limits that govern a lift.

For a crane, wind is a written limit, not background. OSHA's 29 CFR 1926.1417(n) has the competent person adjust the equipment or the operation for wind, ice and snow, makers such as Liebherr print a permissible wind speed on the load chart, and OSHA sets a 20 mph trigger for lifting people. We watch the forecast and the wind for every lift date. A lift stops when the operator or the competent person judges that wind or weather makes it unsafe, as OSHA section 1926.1417 and the crane's manufacturer require; a wind delay is rescheduled, and the written quote says how standby time is billed. Every figure below is a published value as its source gives it, with no arithmetic of ours.

Amarillo Wind Speed by Month: NWS Normals, 1991-2020

March has Amarillo's highest normal wind speed, 15.5 mph, with April close behind at 15.4 mph and August lowest at 12.0 mph, on NWS Amarillo's Records and Normals page, which bases its monthly normals on the 1991-2020 average; the year as a whole averages 13.6 mph. The prevailing direction is southwest from January through April and from October through December, and south from May through September. A second NWS Amarillo source, its 22-year study of daily average wind speeds, covers 2004 through 2025 and says "April is our windiest month, while August is the calmest." The two sources span different years, 1991-2020 and 2004-2025.

A monthly normal is an average, so it hides the gusts that stop a pick. The same 22-year study gives the windiest single day as December 27, 2015, at an average of 34.5 mph, and on March 14, 2025 the airport's weather station measured a record-breaking 83 mph, the NWS reported. Shape matters as much as the calendar: Liebherr's customer magazine says load tables assume a wind area of 1.2 m2 per tonne of load and that "If the load area is greater than this, the wind speed must be reduced," so a broad panel, sign or roof section gets a lower wind limit than a compact load of the same weight. Our rigging and lift planning page shows how a lift plan carries that limit.

Station: Amarillo, as published on the National Weather Service Amarillo office's Records and Normals page. Period: monthly normals based on the 1991-2020 average. Speeds in miles per hour and directions exactly as the page prints them.

Temperature, Rain and Snow at Amarillo: Normals and Records

Amarillo's normal annual high is 72.6 degrees F and its normal annual low 45.0 degrees F, and a normal year brings 19.66 inches of precipitation and 17.2 inches of snow, by the NWS 1991-2020 normals. July is the hottest month, with a normal high of 92.9 degrees F, and January the coldest, with a normal low of 24.9 degrees F. The wettest months are June, July and August, at 2.85, 2.82 and 2.86 inches, February the driest at 0.53 inches, and January and February the snowiest at 4.0 and 3.5 inches. The NWS Amarillo office's climate guide for the Panhandles, which shows no date, gives Amarillo's normal first and last freezes as "Oct 19/ Apr 17."

The records set the outer edges a schedule may meet. The NWS lists Amarillo's record high as 111 degrees F on June 26, 2011 and its record low as -16 degrees F on February 12, 1899, and its longest run of highs at 32 degrees or below since January 1949 as 12 days, from December 30, 1978 to January 10, 1979. The most rain in 24 hours was 7.25 inches on July 7-8, 2010, and the most snow in 24 hours 20.6 inches on March 25-26, 1934. Rain changes the ground as well as the schedule: OSHA's 29 CFR 1926.651(k)(1) requires a competent person's excavation inspection "after every rainstorm or other hazard increasing occurrence," which our excavator rental page covers.

Station: Amarillo, from the National Weather Service Amarillo office's Records and Normals page (normals based on the 1991-2020 average; records over the period the page covers) and, for the freeze dates, the office's Panhandles climate guide, which shows no date.

Severe Weather at Amarillo: Gusts, Hail, Tornadoes, Blizzards, Ice

The strongest wind on Amarillo's books is 84 mph from the southwest on May 15, 1949, a one-minute speed, and since peak gusts started going on climate forms in 1971 the top gust is 81 mph, reached on April 19, 1973, again on June 19, 2008, and once more on July 22, 2011, per the NWS records page. The NWS list of top 10 Amarillo weather events puts that 84 mph reading, clocked at the NWS office at English Field, in its entry for the May 15, 1949 tornado, which caused 7 fatalities and 82 injuries. On March 14, 2025 the airport's ASOS measured "A record breaking wind speed of 83 mph," and the NWS event summary adds that "the only higher recorded wind speed was associated with a tornado"; blowing dust cut visibility below 1/4 of a mile that day.

Hail comes mostly in the warm months. The NWS climate guide for the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles says "93% of all hail events occur between May and September," puts the largest hail at 6 inches at Sunray on June 12, 2010, and counts an average of 21 tornadoes a year across the 23 counties of the two Panhandles. Ice and snow have records of their own: the Great Ice Storm of November 23-25, 1940 left ice on power lines 2 inches in diameter weighing 13 lbs per linear foot, and the March 22-25, 1957 blizzard brought 10 to 20 inches of snow across the Panhandles and 30 ft drifts in the Texas Panhandle. Under a local storm warning, OSHA's 29 CFR 1926.1417(h) has the competent person decide whether to secure the crane as its maker recommends. Lines near a lift are covered in our permit and power line guide.

Station and area as each row states: the Amarillo records are the National Weather Service Amarillo office's; hail, tornado and storm-report rows cover the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles or the office's forecast area. Periods: each record over its source's period; the storm climatology's hail and wind data 1955 to 2009 and its tornado average 1980-2009; NOAA NCEI 1973 to 1996.

The Ground Under a Crane: Pullman Clay, Playas and Caliche

Plan for clay. The USDA's Pullman series, a soil of large extent in the Southern High Plains, is "very deep, well drained, slowly permeable," with 27 to 40 percent clay at the surface and 35 to 50 percent in the subsoil, on slopes of 0 to 3 percent, and at the USDA's Bushland laboratory Pullman clay loam is a moderately permeable surface "underlain by a dense," "very slowly permeable clay soil." Playa floors carry the Randall series, 50 to 60 percent silicate clay and "frequently ponded for very long periods in most years," and "When dry, 1 to 5 cm (0.4 to 2 in) wide cracks extend from the surface to a depth of 102 cm (40 in) or more." Texas Parks and Wildlife counts "Approximately 19,300 playas" in the Texas High Plains, filled mainly by rain that drains "through large cracks in the clay lining," which "eventually swell shut."

OSHA wants the ground ready before the crane. 29 CFR 1926.1402 bars assembling or using a crane "unless ground conditions are firm, drained, and graded" enough, with mats, cribbing or other supporting materials if needed, to meet the maker's support and level specifications, and the controlling entity must provide that preparation and point out voids, tanks or utilities its documents show. A Manitowoc crawler chart requires the crane "leveled to within 1% on a firm supporting surface," Liebherr puts sand, gravel and stone mixtures at "around 200 kN/m2" and calls for a study when bearing capacity is in doubt, and the Handbook of Texas says calcium carbonate under the plains formed "a hard caprock of impervious material, commonly called caliche." Machines for unpaved ground are on our rough-terrain crane page, and mats and ground bearing on our crawler crane page.

Sources and dates as each row states: USDA NRCS Official Series Descriptions, the USDA ARS Bushland laboratory page, Texas Parks and Wildlife, the City of Amarillo and the Handbook of Texas. A series describes a soil type, not your site; the site's own drawings and soil analyses describe the ground under a given setup.

Can a Crane Lift in High Wind? OSHA Rules and Load Chart Limits

A crane can lift in wind up to the limit its manufacturer sets, because OSHA's 29 CFR 1926.1417(a) requires following "all manufacturer procedures applicable to the operational functions of equipment," and section 1926.1417(n) says the competent person "must adjust the equipment and/or operations to address the effect of wind, ice, and snow on equipment stability and rated capacity." Liebherr's customer magazine says "The lifting capacity tables for cranes generally apply in gust speeds of up to 9 m / s (20 mph)," assuming 1.2 m2 of wind area per tonne of load. Liebherr's wind guide defines a gust as the average speed "for a duration of 3 seconds," says that when the wind exceeds the chart's permissible speed "the crane operation must be halted," and warns that the crane's wind sensor reading "must not be used as the sole basis" for the calculation.

Lifting people has its own trigger. Under 29 CFR 1926.1431, when "wind speed (sustained or gusts) exceeds 20 mph at the personnel platform, a qualified person must" decide whether it is not safe to lift personnel, and if so "the lifting operation must not begin (or, if already in progress, must be terminated)." Amarillo's monthly normals run from 12.0 to 15.5 mph, but a normal is an average and these rules turn on the actual wind during the lift. OSHA's scissor lift eTool says lifts "rated for outdoor use are generally limited to wind speeds below 28 miles per hour," as our scissor lift rental page notes. For each lift we follow the forecast; the lift halts whenever the operator or the competent person decides wind or weather has made it unsafe, it moves to another day, and the quote states how standby is billed.

Rules and published limits as each row states, with OSHA's Federal Register citations as the OSHA pages print them. Manufacturer figures belong to the named documents and machines; the crane on a given job follows its own load chart and manual.

Sources & Methodology

Every figure above was taken from the primary sources below (accessed 2026-10-13). Where a number is derived (arithmetic on published figures) or covers a broader period or area, the text says so.

1. National Weather Service Amarillo: Records and Normals for Amarillo — monthly normals based on the 1991-2020 average; wind, temperature, rain and snow records
2. National Weather Service Amarillo: Amarillo's Average Wind Speeds, A 22-Year Study — daily average wind speeds, 2004 through 2025; no publication date shown
3. National Weather Service Amarillo: March 2025 Dust, Wind and Fire — the record airport wind of March 14, 2025
4. National Weather Service Amarillo: climate guide for the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles — freeze dates, hail and tornado figures; no date shown
5. National Weather Service Amarillo: The Severe Convective Storm Climatology of the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandles — hail and wind reports 1955 to 2009; tornadoes 1980-2009
6. National Weather Service Amarillo: top 10 Amarillo weather events — tornado, blizzard, ice storm and snowstorm entries
7. NOAA NCEI engineering weather data, Amarillo TX, WMO No. 723630 — period of record 1973 to 1996
8. USDA NRCS Official Series Description: Pullman series — revised 09/2022
9. USDA NRCS Official Series Description: Randall series — revised 09/2022
10. Texas Parks and Wildlife Department: Panhandle Playa Lakes — no date shown
11. OSHA 29 CFR 1926.1417, Operation (cranes and derricks in construction) — manufacturer procedures, storm warnings, wind, ice and snow
12. OSHA 29 CFR 1926.1431, Hoisting personnel — the 20 mph wind trigger