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January Brought Near-Normal Conditions to NC

Climate Blog

Mar 24, 2015

Winter Recap 2014-15: A Warm Start with a Frigid, Frozen Finish

Today we revisit North Carolina’s winter, including a seasonal summary, a review of predictions from folklore and our own winter outlook, and an ENSO update and outlook. Winter Summary The meteorological winter — December through February — finished as the 40th-coolest and 33rd-driest winter statewide out of 120 years of record. But the whole winter…

Mar 19, 2015

Two NC CoCoRaHS Observers Share Their Stories

We continue our series on CoCoRaHS March Madness with profiles of two observers in North Carolina. Are you cuckoo for CoCoRaHS?! These two North Carolinians are: Jessica Lowman, a teacher in Lenoir County, and Ed Barrows of Wake County, one of our state’s longest reporting volunteers! Although before we get to that, you might be…

Mar 12, 2015

NC Extremes: Storm of the Century Smashed Snowfall Records

This post is part of our year-long series about North Carolina’s weather extremes. An old adage says that March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. But what about the middle of the month? It’s often in between our big winter weather events and our springtime severe weather events. However, in…

Mar 10, 2015

Let the CoCoRaHS March Madness Begin!

This post is the first in a series focusing on the CoCoRaHS network and the 2015 March Madness campaign. More rain is on the way for North Carolina this week, and the return of warmer temperatures as winter gives way to spring will yield greater variability in precipitation amounts as the potential for thunderstorm activity…

Mar 2, 2015

Fe-BRRRR-uary Was Cold and Wintry in NC

February may be the shortest month, but we packed in plenty of cold weather and frozen precipitation during the past 28 days. Coldest February in 35+ Years If you were born in the 80s or later or have moved to North Carolina since then, this was probably the coldest February you’ve ever felt in this…

Feb 26, 2015

Rapid Reaction: More Mixed Precipitation Blankets NC

The third widespread wintry event in less than two weeks painted a familiar picture across the state: Snow falling to the north and west, rain to the southeast, and a narrow band of mixed precipitation in between. The low pressure system responsible for this event began taking shape earlier in the week, when an upper-level…

Feb 25, 2015

NC Extremes: Arctic Air Masses Pack a High-Pressure Punch

This post is part of our year-long series about North Carolina’s weather extremes. When it comes to moving the mercury in barometers up to record-setting levels, nothing does the trick quite like a wintertime Arctic high pressure system. But before we get to North Carolina’s high pressure records, let’s briefly review air pressure, including how…

Feb 17, 2015

Rapid Reaction: Winter Awakens with a Round of Frozen Precip.

The first statewide wintry event of the season brought a mixed bag of precipitation types and left an icy glaze across parts of North Carolina. The mix of precipitation was no surprise with this system; it brought the same sort of conditions to our west as it approached the Appalachians: Alabama and Mississippi received mostly…

Feb 2, 2015

January Brought Near-Normal Conditions to NC

We started 2015 with average temperatures and precipitation that ranked near their normal values across the state. Statewide Temps Typical for January Up-and-down temperatures throughout the month averaged out to near-normal values. The preliminary statewide average temperature of 40.35°F ranks as the 56th-coolest January in 121 years of record. Most sites across the state finished…