The Colorado Front Range has some tremendous winds. They are called Chinook winds and are warm and come out of the mountains. I used to know the meteorlogical reason why they are warm.
Funny story. As a young engineer, I worked on some big foundations for some large experimental wind turbines purposely sited in a high wind area at the base of the foothills. These footings were like 30' square and 5' or so thick with alot or rebar for shrinkage and flexure. The contractor was bitching about the amount of rebar in the footings until their job trailer blew over with them in it...
i have experienced some nasty winds west (and about 1000' higher) of colorado springs. i was leaning at least 45 degrees in to it and still almost getting blown over...then the gusts died for a few seconds and i almost smacked my face on the sidewalk. i think that was the time it went from 60 degrees in the morning to 30 below by dark (so even if i smacked my face, i wouldn't have felt it since it was so cold). the storms coming over the mountains make for crazy weather out there.
One day when I worked on E-470 project in colorado, the safety tip of the day was.. dont leave your truck door open. It can either get closed by the wind and hit someone, OR it will open fully and bend backward and damage your truck. I guess it happened to a lot of people.
My first year in Fort Collins, Chinook winds blew down the tree in our front yard. It also blew the tin storage shed in the back yard into pieces which landed in the front yard. Just last year, I was in Arvada and sustained winds were about 80 mph. We were driving a SUV and barely able to keep the vehicle on the road.
