Wichita Falls Pundit
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06-04-2025 - 5:15 AM - NWS Forecast - Today: Partly sunny, with a high near 77. North wind 7 to 10 mph. Tonight: A 20 percent chance of showers and thunderstorms after 1am. Partly cloudy, with a low around 65. East wind 5 to 7 mph.
06-04-2025 - 5:00 AM - Good Morning! It's Wednesday, and the Wichita Falls and Cly County area Amateur (ham) Radio Skywarn® weather spotters were activated last evening due to storms passing through the two counties. Reports indicated wind damage in the western and southern areas of Wichita Falls. Our lakes continue to benefit from the rains. My Folgers Black Silk coffee is ready. I'll need it to wash down the cold pizza I got from from United Market Street. Yummy!
06-03-2025 - Places to get a beer in Wichita Falls in 1977: Astro Lounge, BJ's Lounge, Bar-B-Que Lounge, Big Mary's, Bimbo Club, Carousel Lounge, Dale's Blue Lounge, Downtown Beer Lounge, El Sombrero Bar, Embers Lounge, Esquire Lounge, Frank's Lounge, George's Salt & Pepper, Irene's Bar & Grill, It'll-Do-Bar, Joe's Doll House, La Fiesta Lounge, Latino Ballroom, Lee's Bar, Little Brothers No. II, Lisa's Palace, Lola Wayne Place, Lone Star Saloon, Millie's Lounge, Mister T's Lounge, Nashville Bar, OUI Lounge, Office Lounge, Pokey's Lounge, Pub Lounge, Red Slipper Lounge, Rock Inn, Show & Tell Lounge, Snoopy's Lounge, Some Place Else Lounge, Sonny's Bar, Tank's Bar, Toodles Lounge, The Town Bar, Western Bar, Western Hills Lounge, Wildcatter Club, and the Zoo Bar.
06-03-2025 - 6:00 PM - The Local Group is alive and well on CB Radio Channel 23. Tune in or join in.
06-03-2025 - 5:00 PM - Due to the approaching storms, Wichita Falls area Amateur (ham) Radio Skywarn® weather spotters have been activated. Tune in at 146.940 MHz on your scanner radio. Hear Clay County spotters at 146.800 MHz. UPDATE: The storm passed over the north side of Wichita Falls with little or no damage. Other parts of the city experienced damaging winds. Small hail was reported in several areas as the storm passed.
06-03-2025 - From my law enforcement consultant - I have no idea what the policy is today, but not too many years ago it was the official policy of the Wichita Falls Police Department to not cite people for jaywalking. The reason was that the offense had never been enforced - at least not in any living person's lifetime - and would not be enforced unless and until a public information campaign announcing enforcement was launched.
06-03-2025 - FEMA Daily Operations Briefing - National Current Ops / Monitoring – June 2–3, 2025
New Significant Incidents / Ongoing Ops:
• No new significant incidents / operations
Hazard Monitoring:
• Severe Weather – Southern Plains to Middle Mississippi Valley
• Excessive Rainfall – Southern Plains to Middle Mississippi Valley and south Florida
• Tropical Activity
Atlantic: Disturbance 1: Low (10%)
Eastern Pacific: Disturbance 1: Med (60%)
Disaster Declaration Activity:
• No new declaration activity
Event Monitoring:
• No new significant events
06-03-2025 - From my law enforcement consultant - Many years ago, a local bank called the police when several men at the drive-thru tried to cash a $700 check from an older woman under suspicious circumstances. When questioned, the men said the check was for work done on the woman's house foundation. Police checked with the woman at her home. She told police the men, who claimed to make foundation repairs, noticed defects in her foundation. It was a pier and beam foundation. She hired them to make repairs. Police, looking into the crawl space, could see that someone had hammered a half-dozen cheap wooden shims into various places. That was the extent of the repair. The woman thanked the bank and the police for investigating. She was happy to get the check back but did not want to pursue civil or criminal action.
06-03-2025 - 6:30 AM - Our local BNSF Railroad folks are up and running on 160.920 MHz. They stay active on that frequency. Walmart is also alive on 154.570 MHz. There's also some local trucking traffic on CB Radio Channel 19 (27.185 MHz). Tune in to all of it with your scanner radio.
BUY TWO-WAY RADIOS & SCANNERS!
06-03-2025 - 6:15 AM - According to Water Data for Texas, Wichita Falls reservoirs are: Arrowhead: 97.7% Kemp: 100.0% Kickapoo: 100.0%. Monitored Water Supply Reservoirs are 99.1% full. The City of Wichita Falls uses combined levels of Arrowhead and Kickapoo (98.85%) to determine drought stage.
06-03-2025 - 6:15 AM - ERCOT (Texas) snapshot of grid conditions - ERCOT reports that conditions are normal and there is enough power for current demand with an operating reserve of 8,390 Megawatts.
06-03-2025 - 6:15 AM - NWS Forecast - Today: Showers and thunderstorms likely, mainly after 1pm. Partly sunny, with a high near 90. South wind 14 to 17 mph, with gusts as high as 26 mph. Chance of precipitation is 70%. New rainfall amounts between a quarter and half of an inch possible. Tonight: Showers and thunderstorms likely, mainly before 10pm. Mostly cloudy, with a low around 61. South wind 10 to 14 mph becoming north after midnight. Winds could gust as high as 21 mph. Chance of precipitation is 70%. New rainfall amounts between a half and three quarters of an inch possible.
06-03-2025 - 6:00 AM - Good Morning! It's Tuesday and the Clay County Amateur Radio Club (Henrietta, Texas) holds a weekly practice net on Tuesdays at 8:00 PM on the 146.800 MHz repeater. As far as I know, all licensed Amateur (ham) Radio operators are invited to check in. Of course, scanner radio enthusiasts can also tune in. Will the forecasted rain over the next few days bring Lake Arrowhead up to 100%, catching up to Kemp and Kickapoo? Having all three of our supply lakes at 100% would be cool. My Folgers Black Silk coffee is 100% ready!
06-02-2025 - 6:00 PM - The Local Group is active on CB Radio Channel 23 this evening. They usually show up around 5:30 PM. Tune in or join in!
06-02-2025 - From my law enforcement consultant - When the 1979 tornado hit Wichita Falls, the Wichita Falls Police Department lost its radio repeater due to the power outage. Since the police vehicle radios had a simplex channel, communications were not lost entirely. Officers could communicate with each other but not with dispatch. During those days, dispatch could listen but not transmit on the simplex frequency. However, important information made its way to officers by simple relaying. A patrol car on an overpass made a good information relay tool. Since much of the town lost the ability to call the police department, dispatchers initially had little information to give to officers. In reality, officers found plenty of work to do on their own.
06-02-2025 - I had a pleasant flashback of listening on my scanner radio for the "jump plane" over Grandfield, Oklahoma, to report to Sheppard AFB Air Traffic Control "jumpers away." Later, I was one of the jumpers reported as "away." And later, I was the jump pilot reporting "jumpers away." Check the scanner frequency page for relevant frequencies.
06-02-2025 – In June 1968, I watched Johnny Cash sing "Ring of Fire" on the Sheppard Air Force Base flight line during an "Operation Entertainment" rehearsal. He asked about the German Air Force pilots training at Sheppard, "What do they call them, German Sheppards?"
06-02-2025 - FEMA Daily Operations Briefing - National Current Ops / Monitoring – June 1–2, 2025
New Significant Incidents / Ongoing Ops:
• Space Weather – G4 (Severe) Geomagnetic Storm – FINAL
Hazard Monitoring:
• Severe Thunderstorms – Southern to Northern Plains
• Excessive Rainfall / Flash Flooding – Central Plains and Southeast
• Tropical Activity
Eastern Pacific: Disturbance 1: Med (40%)
Disaster Declaration Activity:
• No new declaration activity
Event Monitoring:
• No new significant events
06-02-2025 - 8:00 AM - According to Water Data for Texas, Wichita Falls reservoirs are: Arrowhead: 97.6% Kemp: 100.0% Kickapoo: 100.0%. Monitored Water Supply Reservoirs are 99.0% full. The City of Wichita Falls uses combined levels of Arrowhead and Kickapoo (98.8%) to determine drought stage.
06-02-2025 - 8:00 AM - ERCOT (Texas) snapshot of grid conditions - ERCOT reports that conditions are normal and there is enough power for current demand with an operating reserve of 11,706 Megawatts.