Meteorologist Kyle Noel

04/30/2026

BREAKING NEWS: North Carolina has reached "exceptional drought" status (level 4 of 4) for the first time since March 4, 2008. The good news is we're finally getting rain again... but the bad news is we'll need months to catch up on the precipitation to erode the ongoing drought. Our streamflows are at record-low and multiple large lakes have fallen to levels that triggered water restrictions. A more cool and wetter pattern is on the way next few weeks so hopefully that'll help us to finally turn this drought around.

Graphic source: NC State Climate Office

04/16/2026

I don't think people understand how bad the drought has gotten here in North Carolina. One of WRAL reporters took this picture at Falls Lake, which is the main drinking water source for the city of Raleigh and several towns of Wake County.

04/15/2026

City of Raleigh is moving to stage 1 of water restrictions, starting on Monday, April 20th. This will also include customers in towns of Wake Forest, Rolesville, Knightdale, Wendell, and Zebulon. More here: https://www.facebook.com/share/1AyaE6CRf9/

It’s hot. It’s dry. We don’t need to tell you that. But we do need to tell you we’re activating Stage 1 water-use restrictions effective Monday, April 20. So what does that mean?

💧 Automatic and non-automatic spray irrigation is allowed between midnight and 10 a.m. Homes with odd-numbered addresses may water on Tuesdays. Homes with even-numbered addresses may water on Wednesdays.

💧 Irrigation of landscapes is recommended at a maximum of one-half inch per week.

💧 Hose-end sprinklers: Use from 6–10 a.m. or 6–10 p.m. on Tuesdays (odd-numbered addresses) or Wednesdays (even-numbered addresses).

💧 Water customers must abide by reductions. Penalties apply for noncompliance.

03/19/2026

Tired of the cold? Good news... many of us in the Carolinas should have a nice warm up this upcoming weekend. It'll be beautiful and sunny!

Saturday:

NC: upper 70s
SC: low 80s

Sunday:

NC: low 80s
SC: mid-to-upper 80s

Take down a few degrees from that if you're in higher elevation areas.

03/17/2026

That last line of storms finally brought in the highly anticipated wind that I mentioned in my previous posts. Not exactly what I had in mind, timing wise, but the cold front itself brought 45-60 mph gusts across several metropolitan areas of North Carolina. Fallen trees and power outages are being reported in a few spots. Further up the I-95, especially in the Washington/Baltimore region, gusts were stronger up to about 75 mph or so. I guess that our "moderate risk" technically verified across the Mid-Atlantic with the wind threat... but barely. Our tornado threat definitely busted, no doubt about it... but I'm sure all of us are at least happy that it did.

03/16/2026

I'm not really seeing anything impressive in the Carolinas. Most likely a glorified rain storm with some wind. That's just severe weather forecasting sometimes... sometimes things will come up to kill the threat at the last minute. In this case, more rain showers and clouds formed ahead of the line than expected and killed the instability. I'm just glad things are looking a lot less dangerous and I do apologize for the inconvenience. It's just better safe than sorry just in case. Meteorology is tough that even humans and computers are still struggling with at times.

03/16/2026

As of this post, our main line is entering the NC Foothills and the upstate SC. It is primarily a damaging wind event with a couple weak, short-lived tornadoes possibly embedded within the line. As a result, warnings are likely to be issued for them in the Carolinas throughout the day.

However, there's a lot of forcing behind this line and... it sounds counterproductive, but it's actually making it less favorable for the line to break up into discrete mode, which would've promoted stronger, long-lived tornadoes in the EF2-3 range. Having more instability would've helped to break up the line into discrete cells, but since that is uncertain, the ceiling of our tornado threat is still very uncertain beyond having a lot of weaker, short-lived tornadoes in the EF0-1 range. The downside of these weaker, short-lived tornadoes, though... they are MUCH more difficult to warn for and they can hit-and-disappear in an instant.

Regardless of the tornado risk, the wind is still our main story with many airports in the Carolinas reporting gusts of 30+ mph. As our squall line speeds up eastward, it will be capable of having pockets of localized severe wind as high as 60-75 mph for a brief minute. This could do damage to trees and anything that is not tied down. Be ready for anything, y'all... and definitely do not ignore warnings.

03/16/2026

I'll revisit this in the morning and make the final call... but I am growing more skeptical of the tornado risk for tomorrow. The potential is slowly getting more capped with time on these short-range models, mainly due to the instability getting decreased because our squall line is speeding up... thus, less time for the sunlight to charge up the atmosphere ahead of the line. We'll see... definitely the "day of" accessment to make in the morning.

Regardless of the tornado threat, our main threat is still the brief damaging wind (60+ mph) from our main squall line and is still worthy of our rare "moderate risk" (level 4 of 5). It'll also be awfully gusty (30-40+ mph) outside of thunderstorms and ahead of the line.

03/16/2026

Timing of tomorrow's event:

There will be some morning storms to start the day. Some, but not all, will be lightly severe with strong wind (40+ mph) being the primary threat. The main show, however, will be a solid squall line following through behind these morning storms. As storms roll into central Carolinas, by 3 pm or so, they should begin to strengthen with the instability increasing. There's a chance this line could break up into semi-discrete cells, where they could become more tornadic. The "peak" of this event should be between 3 pm to 6 pm for Raleigh, Durham, Fayetteville, Richmond (VA), and Florence (SC). Some cells, but not all, will attempt to produce long-tracking tornadoes. Key word... attempt. If we do get tornadoes, though, a couple of them could be in the "intense" range (EF2/EF3). This "main event" threat will still be present for most of the eastern North Carolina (along and east of I-95) into sunset hours.

Bottom line, regardless of the tornado threat, strong to severe wind *should* be the primary threat impacting far more people. Be ready for that. Even on "big days", statistically wise, it's still unlikely that you'll see a tornado... but please be prepared and listen to warnings if you do get them. Your local news will be the best source on days like tomorrow and we're lucky that we have many incredible TV meteorologists here in the Carolinas.

03/15/2026

Storm Prediction Center (SPC) released their Day 2 forecast for tomorrow's severe weather event and... wow.

This is the first "moderate risk" (level 4 of 5) of severe weather for Raleigh, Durham, and Fayetteville since March 2021. It is also the first 15% or greater probability of tornadoes since March 2021. However, that outlook was later downgraded... so if we skip that one, you would have to go back to February 24, 2016 for the previous case.

I must stress that SPC recently recalibrated their entire system for issuing storm probabilities. This should lead to more liberal issuances of higher probabilities for individual severe hazards... and the Carolinas are getting the honor of being the very first test subject of this new system.

For example, this is the first issuance of a 60% probability of significant wind anywhere in the country since the summer of 2014. SPC's first ever issuance of a 75% probability is also on the table... which would really underscore the liberalism of this new system if they choose to go there.

Unfortunately, the ceiling is also getting higher for multiple significant tornadoes (EF2+) to form across the Mid-Atlantic region from South Carolina to Maryland. It is hard to disagree with SPC's assessment because we could see an overlap of intense storm-relative helicity (300 to 400 m²/s²) and fast storm motions of 60+ knots with pockets of instability between 1000 and 1500 J/kg along the front moving into central North Carolina and southern Virginia. If fully realized, we could see multiple supercell thunderstorms producing long-track tornadoes that could be significant (EF2+). But that is only if the potential is fully realized.

Severe weather setups like this, especially in the Carolinas, are incredibly sensitive to thermodynamics and atmospheric kinematics overlapping just right. You can have all the ingredients in place and still end up with a limited tornado threat. This happened on February 24, 2016 in North Carolina... although that day was far more eventful for Virginia with several major tornadoes there. However, if things do align just right... well... that is how we ended up with several EF3 tornadoes tearing across North Carolina on April 16, 2011.

That day in 2011 was also our last "high risk" (level 5 of 5) for severe weather... and for a good reason. With this new system, though, I am unsure if SPC is willing to go that far with this round of storms. They are now factoring in storm intensity along with spatial coverage and the number of storms that could form... so we will have to see. This post is getting long, so I will save that explanation for another time.

03/14/2026

Well... it looks like the Storm Prediction Center (SPC) is being pretty aggressive with its severe weather forecast for Monday. This is the *FIRST TIME* ever that SPC has forecast a 45% probability of severe weather three days out for the Carolinas, Virginia, Maryland, and Washington, D.C. So yeah... that's quite a statement from them.

SPC is also hinting at a possible upgrade to a "moderate risk" of severe weather (Level 4 of 5) for the 45% area on the map below. This would likely include cities of Raleigh, Durham, Fayetteville, and Florence (SC). We haven’t had a "moderate risk" day in several years, which shows just how serious Monday could be from a weather standpoint.

Of course, we’ll continue to monitor things closely. It’s still possible this outlook gets walked back before the event. The last time a "moderate risk" was issued at Day 2 for east of the mountains, it was later downgraded to an "enhanced risk" and that day ultimately produced only a handful of weak tornadoes.

A careful approach is always required when forecasting severe weather in the Carolinas. In this case, I’d really like to see more mesoscale details come into focus before sharing exactly what I think might happen. It’s possible the Storm Prediction Center is being a bit aggressive this far out, but at the same time, I can see the high-end potential with this setup as well.