Hurricane (Typhoon) — Eastern Hyde, North Carolina

2018-09-13 to 2018-09-15 · Eastern Hyde, North Carolina

Event narrative

Widespread heavy rain and strong winds developed over the region from the morning of September 13th through the evening of September 15th. Rainfall was generally 5' to 10' over the county. Heavy rainfall across the county led to flash flooding with some roads impassable due to a combination of heavy rain and storm surge. Gusty northeast winds developed ahead of Florence as the storm approached the coast, with a peak wind gust of 83 mph at a mesonet station on Ocracoke Island on the evening of September 13th. The gusty winds combined with saturated ground led to some downed trees and power outages.

Wider weather episode

Hurricane Florence was a long-lived Cape Verde hurricane and the wettest tropical cyclone on record in the Carolinas. The sixth named storm, third hurricane, and the first major hurricane of the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season, Florence originated from a strong tropical wave that emerged off the west coast of Africa on August 30, 2018. Florence became a tropical depression near Cape Verde on August 31 and progressed west-northwest, becoming a Tropical Storm on September 1. Florence strengthened rapidly on September 4'5, becoming a Category 4 storm on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph. Florence weakened to a tropical storm by September 7, but the system regained hurricane strength on September 9 and major hurricane status with winds of 140 mph on September 10. However, increasing wind shear caused the storm's winds to gradually weaken over the next few days. However, the storm's wind field continued to grow. By the evening of September 13, Florence had been downgraded to a Category 1 hurricane. Hurricane Florence made landfall near Wrightsville Beach early on Saturday September 15, and weakened further as it slowly moved inland.

Florence produced extensive wind damage along the North Carolina coast from Cape Lookout, across Carteret, Onslow, Pender and New Hanover counties. Thousands of downed trees caused widespread power outages to nearly all of eastern North Carolina. The historic legacy of Hurricane Florence will be record breaking storm surge of 9 to 13 feet and widespread devastating rainfall of 20 to 30 inches, locally up to 36 inches, which produced catastrophic and life-threatening flooding. The hardest hit areas included New Bern, Newport, Belhaven, Oriental, North Topsail Beach and Jacksonville, along with Downeast Carteret County, or basically south of a line from Kinston to Cedar Island. A storm total rainfall of 34.00 inches was reported in Swansboro, while the NWS office in Newport recorded 25.20 inches. Wind gusts of 106 mph were reported at Cape Lookout with 105 mph at Fort Macon.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 787021. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.