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1934: Massive dust storm strikes Eastern US cities

1934: Massive dust storm strikes Eastern US cities

Author: AccuWeather May 12, 2022 Duration: 3:02
This Date in Weather History
History
Newspapers and radio stations East of the Mississippi on the morning of May 12, 1934 carried ominous messages and headlines of a thickening black cloud of chocking dust and dirt moving out of the Great Plains states. The cloud would envelope the Mid-west and then Eastern states on May 12, turning mid-day sunlight into an eerie darkness, that seemed like night in many major cities. What happened? Actually, the causes can be traced back decades. Favorable weather conditions in the from 1900 to the 1920s with significant rainfall and relatively moderate winters, encouraged increased population and farming in the Great Plains. But the region entered an unusually dry period in the summer of 1930.  During the next decade, the Northern Plains suffered four of their driest years in almost 100 years. When this severe drought hit the Great Plains region in the 1930s, it resulted in erosion and loss of topsoil because of farming practices at the time. The drought dried the topsoil and over time it became reduced to a powdery consistency. Native high grasses that held the soil in place had been plowed under to make room for expanding crop lands, so when high winds that occur on the plains picked up the topsoil massive dust clouds and dust storms occurred, giving rise to the term Dust Bowl. The continuous dry weather caused crops to fail, leaving the plowed fields exposed to wind erosion. The fine soil of the Great Plains was easily picked up and carried east by strong winds. In November 1933, a very strong dust storm stripped topsoil from South Dakota farmlands in just one of a series of severe dust storms that year. But beginning on May 9, 1934, a strong, several days dust storm removed massive amounts of Great Plans soil in one perhaps the worst storm of the Dust Bowl.  The dust clouds first blew all the way to Chicago, where they deposited 12 million pounds of dust. By May 12, 1934, the same storm reached cities to the east, such as Cleveland, Buffalo, Boston, New York City and Washington, D. C. turning day to night and chocking millions of people as dirt all the way from the plains states was deposited more than 1000 miles away on the streets and in the homes of major cities.

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Every day has a story written in the wind and rain, and This Date in Weather History uncovers those narratives. With AccuWeather Meteorologist Evan Myers as your guide, this daily podcast connects the present to pivotal moments where weather dramatically altered the course of events. You might hear about a forgotten blizzard that stranded a city, a hurricane that redirected a war, or a simple shift in the breeze that allowed a historic discovery. It’s more than just a list of facts; it’s a look at how the atmosphere has been a relentless and fascinating character in the human drama. Each brief episode offers a specific, grounded tale, revealing how the climate has shaped cultures, economies, and personal lives in ways we often overlook. Tune in for a thoughtful blend of meteorology and historical context, delivered with the authority of AccuWeather. This podcast turns the calendar into a map of atmospheric intrigue, reminding us that the past is always present in the sky above.
Author: Language: English Episodes: 50

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This Date in Weather History
Podcast Episodes
1978: 11" of rain falls on "Sun Day" in New Orleans [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:20
Most of New Orleans, Louisiana is below the flowing water level of the Mississippi River, that also means that the city is below sea level and so both the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Pontchartrain surfaces are also above the…
2009: Storm collapses roof of Dallas Cowboys' practice facility [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:24
Twelve people were hospitalized Saturday May 2, 2009 after the roof of the Dallas Cowboys' indoor practice facility in Frisco, Texas collapsed during a thunderstorm. The giant blue Cowboys star atop the building lay crum…
1854: 90 consecutive hours of rain falls in New England [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:05
The winter of 1853-1854 had been a particularly snowy one across the mountains of Vermont and New Hampshire. Not record breaking, but it was a cold winter and the snows that fell during the winter months didn’t melt much…
1887: Massive Flooding at China's "Yellow River" [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:43
The Huang He (Wang He) or Yellow River is one of the longest rivers in China, at 3,398 miles, it loops northward from the mountains in western China, then flows east, each year bringing 1.6 billion tons of fine-grained s…
1991: Tropical storm surge floods Bangladesh [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:15
On April 22, 1991 an area of tropical thunderstorms began to organize in the Bay of Bengal it would grow to become one of the deadliest tropical cyclones ever recorded. The storm hit, one of the most populated areas in B…
1992: "Grapefruit-sized" hail devastates parts of Texas [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:11
A hailstone begins as a water droplet that is swept upward by an updraft inside of a thundercloud. Inside the cloud, there are a large number of other supercooled water droplets already present. These supercooled particl…
2004: High temperatures smash records across Southern California [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:05
Santa Ana Winds occur when air from an area of high pressure over the dry, desert region of the southwestern U.S. flows westward in its clockwise circulation toward the California coast. This creates dry winds that flow…
1986: The Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:42
The Chernobyl, Russia nuclear disaster was the worst nuclear disaster in history and occurred at the Chernobyl Nuclear Reactor Plant. A catastrophic eruption ripped through the power plant on April 26, 1986, spewing radi…
1982: Lightning strike damages Alabama town's water supply [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 2:02
Most lightning strikes occur from cloud to cloud – but about 20% go from clouds to the ground. Lightening striking the ground has caused problems with pipes and water supplies.. Some people have also experienced cloudy o…

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