Flagpole installation acrossNebraska

Flagpoles in Nebraska

State work in Lincoln, base work at Bellevue, and school, grain and campus jobs the length of the Platte. The pole, the concrete footing, the flag and the labour go on one quote, settled before anyone digs.

Wind here. Nebraska is 430 miles wide and the wind map barely moves across it: about 110 mph at the Missouri bluffs, about 110 mph at the Wyoming line, and much the same the whole way between. Nebraska writes no wind map of its own, and the older edition of the national one put every county at 115, so both figures are still in circulation. Either way, the mapped speed is not what picks the pole here — exposure is. On section-line ground with no ridge, no shelterbelt and nothing built upwind, a summer gust front arrives at full strength. Hail is the other Nebraska hazard, and it costs flags long before it costs shafts.

• The Missouri bluffs and the river counties — About 110 mph, no different from the rest of the state. The ground is the variable: deep loess above the river, firm as rock while it is dry and letting go once it is wet, so the footing is drawn for the soil rather than for the height.
• The eastern till plains — About 110 mph through Lincoln, Omaha and the towns between them. Street grids and old trees give real shelter, so a standard wall usually does, and what is saved on the shaft buys height or a better finish.
• The Platte valley and the farm ground — The same 110 mph on paper, and wide open in fact. We size these as open terrain, which asks a heavier wall at the same height, and valley sand and gravel take a broader footing than clay would.
• The Sandhills and the Panhandle — 110 mph again, and no part of the state is drawn as a special wind region. What the flat map misses is the Pine Ridge and Wildcat Hills: wind speeds up over an escarpment, so a site on the lip is sized for that and not off the map. This corner also sits in what forecasters call Hail Alley, where the state meets Colorado and Wyoming, so a second flag on the shelf is sensible.

Flying the Nebraska flag? We sell it, sewn to the state's own design specification and sized to sit under the national flag on your pole. See the Nebraska flag →