Joel BurgessAsheville Citizen Times
Today's burning question is about potential weirdness in weather in parts of Western North Carolina. Have other questions for our staff? Email Executive Editor Karen Chávez at KChavez@citizentimes.com and your question could appear in an upcoming column.
Question: It seems many weather systems pass south of Hendersonville, missing Asheville. What is the reason for this pattern?
Answer: Having lived here for over two decades, I had some of my own theories about how the rows of mountain ridges disrupt rain fronts, snow and other weather patterns. And it turns out, I was wrong.
Doug Outlaw, a meteorologist and veritable institution with the National Weather Service in Greer, South Carolina, dispelled those ideas about mountain peak deflection, or whatever I was thinking.
"In this season, where it is warm and we have showers and thunderstorms practically every day in a random fashion, some places get good rainfall and some places miss out and don’t get a drop," Outlaw told me July 9. He also pointed to data showing the Asheville and Hendersonville areas weren't out of the norm in terms of surrounding parts of WNC.
In the winter, fronts originating in Canada tend to be pretty strong, Outlaw said, and maintain that strength as they push into the Appalachians.
"But this time of year, we have weak fronts," he said. "That's what is largely behind the randomness of showers and storms."
In terms of the chance of rain, most of what matters is the presence of moisture, he said, and that depends on activity in the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean.
That's not to say we aren't experiencing some abnormally hot and dry weather.
Interestingly, it started with above average rainfall in May, with 4.96 inches for the Asheville area, including Hendersonville − as measured at the Asheville Regional Airport. An average May sees 4.48 inches.
Then, in June, the spigot got tightened to 2.16 inches, most of it falling in the first few days. The average for the month is 4.3 inches. The driest June on record, according to NWS records, was 0.85 inches in 2008.
July averages 4.67 inches of rain. So far, we've had 1.08 inches of measurable rain.
And what does that dryness mean? As a state, every one of N.C.'s 100 counties is feeling the effects, according to the N.C. Drought Management Advisory Council. Ten counties (none in WNC) are experiencing "severe drought," the third highest on a scale of five. Buncombe and Henderson are among 69 counties in the "moderate drought," or the second stage, while 21 counties are "abnormally dry," the lowest on the drought scale. Among those are Madison and Transylvania.
According to Laura Oleniacz, spokesperson for the Water Resources Division of the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality, the dryness is not uniform, with some normally wet areas in the Buncombe-Henderson area being parched.
"The station at Bent Creek saw its third driest 30-day period in its 23-year period of record, according to data from the Southeast Regional Climate Center," Oleniacz said.
The State Climate Office of N.C., which drills down to an even more local level than the National Weather Service, showed Hendersonville well below its 4.99-inch June average, said Corey Davis, assistant state climatologist.
"Hendersonville...had its 6th-driest June on record, with only 1.21 inches of rain all month, or 3.78 inches below average," he said.
And back to the heat that's helping dry everything out and make everyone miserable, Davis pointed to July 5 when Asheville had its hottest day of the year so far with a high of 93 degrees.
"It has only been that warm there five times in the past dozen years, most recently on Aug. 25 of last year," he said. "While that's not the 100-degree heat that parts of eastern N.C. have had recently, it's still unusually hot for this part of the state, and warm enough to have an impact on people -- especially those working outdoors, and on drying out the landscape even faster."
It's hard to tie one or two months of very hot or very dry weather to climate change, but in general the world is seeing hotter temperatures, according to scientists such as those with the National Centers for Environmental Information, located in Asheville. Those rising temperatures are part of human-caused climate change, according to those scientists, and can spur new and more extreme weather patterns, such as drought and flooding.
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Joel Burgess has lived in WNC for more than 20 years, covering politics, government and other news. He's written award-winning stories on topics ranging from gerrymandering to police use of force. Got a tip? Contact Burgess atjburgess@citizentimes.com, 828-713-1095 or on Twitter@AVLreporter. Please help support this type of journalism with asubscriptionto the Citizen Times.
