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NC Extremes: Spring Freezes Prove Costly for Agriculture

Climate Blog

Jun 25, 2015

Rapid Reaction: The Return of Drought

If you caught the news this morning, you may have heard about the appearance of drought in North Carolina for the first time in over two years! With other notable droughts also in the news — like the one that’s impacting California, Oregon, and Washington — you also might be concerned about whether NC is…

Jun 23, 2015

NC Extremes: NC Pocosins a Hotspot for Large Wildfires

This post is part of our year-long series about North Carolina’s weather extremes. Extreme weather conditions such as drought and high winds can provide an ideal environment for wildfires to ignite and spread. Many of these large fires have occurred on the Albemarle-Pamlico Peninsula in eastern North Carolina. That’s no coincidence according to Cabe Speary,…

Jun 17, 2015

Pluto Climate Summary: An Ice Storm on the Way?

Rather than covering developments in North Carolina’s climate, in this post, we’re looking a bit farther away. Specifically, more than three billion miles away on the distant dwarf planet Pluto, where it’s a bit colder and dimmer than in North Carolina, but still subject to its own local climate. For many of us, Pluto is…

Jun 8, 2015

Weather and Fossils Collide at the Aurora Fossil Festival

Part of the mission of the State Climate Office is to increase public awareness of variations in North Carolina’s climate and environment. One way to do this is to attend different events and festivals throughout the state. A recent example of this occurred on May 23, when we participated in the 2015 Aurora Fossil Festival…

Jun 1, 2015

A Warm, Dry May Wraps Up a Similar Spring

May saw above-normal temperatures continue and a return of dry conditions, especially in western North Carolina. May Heats Up Across the State Last month’s statewide average temperature of 67.76°F (1.42°F above the long-term average) made it the 29th-warmest May in the past 121 years. Several stations with shorter periods of record had one of their…

May 28, 2015

Summer and Tropical Outlook: What Effects Might El Niño Have?

This time of year, our thoughts often turn to the ocean. It’s a great place for a vacation, and often a welcome relief from stress and heat. As climatologists, we also think about the oceans — Atlantic and Pacific — because they can give us some clues about how our summer weather and hurricane season…

May 12, 2015

Slow-Moving Ana Brings Steady Rains to Eastern NC

Although three weeks remain until the traditional start of hurricane season, some recent activity in the Atlantic gave us the first named storm — Tropical Storm Ana — a bit earlier than usual. Ana’s life began as a disorganized collection of showers and thunderstorms associated with a weak low pressure system over the Bahamas. As…

May 4, 2015

April Showers Alleviate Lingering Dryness

After several months of dry weather in western North Carolina, April saw plenty of precipitation across that region along with above-normal temperatures across the state. Temperatures Trend Above Normal Our warm finish to March carried over into April, as the statewide average temperature of 59.31°F ranked as the 34th-warmest April since 1895. However, our average…

May 1, 2015

NC Extremes: Spring Freezes Prove Costly for Agriculture

This post is part of our year-long series about North Carolina’s weather extremes. May is generally associated with warming temperatures, springtime thunderstorms, and rain showers to feed emerging plants. But several times in recent history, including a record-setting event in early May of 1963, the onset of spring has been interrupted by a wintertime relic…