Dear Tom,
I believe, in general, wind speeds increase during the day and are definitely stronger than at night. Am I correct?
— Cary Tucker
Dear Cary,
You are correct. Sun-induced heating during the day disappears with the onset of darkness and, if the weather is not stormy, winds typically fade to calm or near calm around sunset. Nighttime cooling sets up a situation in which cooler, denser air collects near the ground and milder temperatures prevail above, effectively shunting winds that reach the ground during the day away from the surface. Those winds continue to blow through the night several hundred feet aloft. With the return of sunlight and heating the next morning, winds return to the surface. The effect is less pronounced during the winter because of a lower sun angle and less heat input from sunlight (and more overall storminess than in summer), but it's still there.
