Wind in Edmonton: Summary

Edmonton Weather Nerdery had never really talked about wind before, and so to make up for that we have done an epic, 9-part odyssey. The whole thing can be a bit overwhelming, be here are the highlights:

Part 1: Is it windier than it used to be?

• Nope. Average windspeed each year, highest windspeed each year, and strongest gusts each year are all down at both Blatchford and the International Airport, especially compared to the 1960s.

Part 2: When is it windy?

• Our average windspeed and windiest hour each day peak in mid-May, and are lowest in August. During the day windspeeds are highest on-average at 1-2PM.

Part 3: How windy is windy?

• Hourly windspeeds stretch from 0 to 87km/h, and are centred around 13km/h. Only 4% of our hours are 30km/h or more, 0.8% are 40km/h or more, and 0.1% are 50km/h or more.

Part 4: How many windy days do we get each year?

• These have dropped a lot since the 1960s. Now we have about 30 days hit 40km/h each year, compared to 60 days each year in the 1960s. For 60km/h days we might have 1 every few years, but in the 1960s had about 2 per year.

Part 5: Windy Dates & Days

• Through 60 years of history, May 17th stands out as a particularly windy date in Edmonton

Part 6: Windy Months

• Our windiest months were mostly clustered from about 1960~1973. But April and May continue to be fairly windy.

Part 7: Wind Direction and Part 8: Wind Direction (again)

• Edmonton has a surprising number of hours with winds from the South, BUT those are mostly for low windspeeds. When we look at speeds of 20km/h+ it is mostly from the NW, with a bit from the SE.

Part 9: Versus Calgary & Winnipeg

• Windspeeds in Calgary & Winnipeg are also lower than they used to be. The pattern is not identical to Edmonton, but it is similar.
• Winnipeg really is a lot windier than Edmonton, and Calgary is too.

We can't post something here without including at least one chart, so here is the very fancy wind rose from Part 8: Wind Direction (again)