Hurricane/Nor'Easter

This week's weather has been kind of weird. Rain in and of itself isn't weird, but the way it came (and it's reluctance to leave) has been. The system that brought us 4.2 inches of rain over the last three days started as a hurricane and morphed into a good ole Nor'Easter. The Carolinas is the spot where it did it's morphing. First the moisture was coming out of the Gulf. Then it switched to coming out of the Atlantic, and it was like a switch was flipped and it was instantly Wintertime with almost-icy gales. Even though the rain has mostly left at this moment the wind is still howling outside!

If this system had occurred in mid Winter we could've seen a snowstorm like we've never seen! It might have been the Blizzard of '93 all over again, but with 50+ inches of snowfall! As much as I like snow 50 inches of snow around here would've been quite the natural disaster and quite inconvenient.

Am I the only that sits around imagining perfect storms?

Anyway, I think we can now safely say the drought is over.

October Weather Recap

To say that it's been a rainy summer and fall would almost be an understatement, although it's been decidedly less rainy in the Charlotte area than it has been in Western North Carolina. In October it seemed we had some measurable precipitation every week...most weeks averaging a half an inch to an inch of precipitation. I was so busy in October that I didn't give due diligence to documenting rainfall as I usually do; however, during the last week of October into Nov. 1 we had a cumulative total of around three inches of rain.

If I had to describe the climate of October 2009 I would have to say it resembled the climate of England as we had many days that were socked in, drizzly, and cool. This weather observer is not complaining. We really needed the rain after the dry years of 2007 and 2008.

The first week of November promises to be dry, but it remains to be seen if November will prove to be the beginning of a drying trend.

A Gray, Drizzly Monday

The rain began last night (Sunday) shortly before 11 p.m. By 7:00 a.m. this morning we measured approximately a 1/2 inch in the rain gauge. It rained pretty much the whole morning (on and off), and the afternoon has remained gray and drizzly as the system slowly moves off the East Coast. I know the mountains didn't need anymore rain, but here in the Piedmont we were happy to see the gentle, steady rainfall. For the next two days we have about a 30-40% chance of showers each day, but last night and today was the most substantial rainfall predicted until next weekend.

Gosh, I Hope that Head Doesn't move Eastward

Title Clarification Backed Up By a Video

For those of you who did not spend inordinate amounts of time in Sunday School/Bible School as a kid drinking Kool-Aid, eating stale store-brand Oreo knock-off cookies and singing nonsensical songs about Bible stories this video will clue you in to the meaning behind the title of the post about flooding yesterday.

I'm really shocked that my husband did not know this song as I know he spent inordinate amounts of time as a child doing all the above.

Now, I can't get the song out of my head.

In Brevard They Should Consider Building an Arky, Arky

Here's an excerpt of an e-mail I sent to my co-worker's today concerning flooding in my Hometown of Brevard, North Carolina. Photos are compliments of Melissa Dill Wells (My old high school buddy and Facebook friend):

Farmland flooded. It’s called “Lake Brevard” when it floods ;-) The mountains in the background are about three miles away and the majority of that whole area is covered in flood water.

Highway flooding…this is what is causing a lot of people to be homebound this week. Transylvania County is the home of the headwaters of the French Broad River which is why flooding is a big problem there. Fortunately, since there is plenty of higher land in the area most peoples’ homes are out of the flood plain. Sod farms are the big business in farming now, so they get hit the worst…in the short term…by flooding.

My Father has recorded nearly 12 inches of rain in eight days…9 ½ of which (approximately) fell between Saturday night and Monday night. They’re just happy they didn’t get 20 inches like the folks in Atlanta! The rain has stopped…for now.

On the homefront...we were gone to Brevard over the weekend, and experienced some of the torrential rain firsthand. It pretty much started raining heavily on Saturday evening and did not let up very much until late Sunday afternoon. It was still raining moderately when we left to return to Charlotte and it rained hard again on Monday in Brevard exacerbating the flooding problem.

Upon our return to Charlotte I noted an inch and three-quarters in our rain gauge which fell during some evening storms on Saturday evening. It's been dry ever since with intermittent clouds and sunshine for the past two days.

Note: You can see more of Melissa's Photos below:

Cloudy Week

Well, so far this week it's been cloudy but not much rain. Between last night and 7:00 a.m. this morning we got a quarter of an inch in the rain gauge. Today has been relatively dry except for a few sprinkles here and there. We have a slightly higher chance of rain tomorrow (60%) and it drops down to a 40% chance over the weekend. With the cloud cover it's been cooler of course, and that's refreshing. I do hope we see more substantial rain over the next few days. It will help the Fall leaf color and lessen the chance of wildfire which is always a concern this time of year.

We hope you have a great weekend!