Dangerous Chinook Winds

Adiabatic Warming of Downward Moving Air Produces the Chinook Winds (Wikipedia)

January 24th, 1982- Chinook winds plagued the foothills of southeastern Wyoming and northern and central Colorado for the second straight Sunday. The winds gusted to 140 mph at Wondervu CO, located northeast of Denver. Chinook winds a week earlier produced wind gusts to 137 mph. (Storm Data) 

The Chinook is a foehn wind, a rain shadow wind which results from the subsequent warming of air which has dropped most of its moisture on windward slopes (orographic lift). As a consequence of the different rates of moist and dry air, the air on the leeward slopes becomes warmer than equivalent elevations on the windward slopes. As moist winds from the Pacific (also called Chinooks) are forced to rise over the mountains, the moisture in the air is condensed and falls out as precipitation, while the moist air cools at a fast rate. The dried air then descends on the leeward side of the mountains, warming at the dry air at a fast rate. The turbulence of the high winds also can prevent the normal nocturnal temperature inversion from forming on the lee side of the slope, allowing night-time temperatures to remain elevated. (Wikipedia)