WRAL meteorologist Elizabeth Gardner explains why Helene was such a catastrophic storm for Asheville and all of western North Carolina.
WRAL meteorologist Elizabeth Gardner explains why Helene was such a catastrophic storm for western North Carolina.
Gardner, a WRAL meteorologist since 1998, said, in the many years she has tracked hurricanes, she has never seen anything like this in the mountains of North Carolina, even though the area has been hit with tropical systems dozens of times.
Rain totals from Helene were catastrophic:
The devastating flooding across western North Carolina is not solely from Helene, Gardner explained. The storm had a predecessor, or a pre-storm.
« We had a low to the north [and] we had a cold front coming off that low, and that cold front stalled right there in the mountains », Garner said. « That happened on Wednesday, we watched it happen. »
Asheville had already experienced periods of rain on Wednesday, Wednesday night and Thursday before Helene even passed North Carolina.
