Giving us an update on Tropical Storm Debby, I’m turning to climatologist Corey Davis with the State Climate Office of North Carolina, Corey we’ve already seen to the south of us some really, really heavy rains are. Is that what we can expect here in the Carolinas as well?
“Well, unfortunately, Mike, you’re right. We’ve seen what Debby is capable of. We’ve already seen it in parts of the Carolinas, even. But going down to Florida, places like Bradenton, Sarasota had 12 inches of rain. We’ve seen similar totals already from the Hilton Head and Savannah areas in South Carolina and Georgia, and those are the sorts of totals that we’re expecting over the next two to three days, especially across parts of southeastern North Carolina and eastern South Carolina. Some of the forecasts continuing to show totals upwards of 15 inches in those spots. So when we think about some of our wettest hurricanes. Matthew, Florence come to mind. This may not be as wet as Florence, but it’s certainly going to be right up there with Matthew based on what those totals are looking like and how the storm is progressing at the moment.”
With that in mind, how much we’re talking about a very slow moving system, how much rain do you think the eastern parts of South Carolina and North Carolina. How much could they get?
“Well, first, Mike, you said it this is a very slow moving storm. You know, usually when we see these storms that come up from Florida, they’re moving pretty quickly by the time they get to the Carolinas. We think back to hurricane Ian a couple years ago. It took a similar track moved in through coastal South Carolina, up across North Carolina. It was in and out within 24 hours. But that is not the case with Debbie here. It is still spinning off the coast of South Carolina. Probably won’t even make landfall in coastal South Carolina until tomorrow morning. So all during that time, we’re going to be sitting under these rain bands. We’re going to be getting, at times, heavy rainfall. And again, the forecasts that we’re looking at are showing pretty widespread totals of eight to 15 inches across the eastern half of North Carolina. Same story in South Carolina, really, from Columbia eastward to the coast. And some of those heavy spots could easily see 14,15 inches. And again, based on some of the totals that we saw even yesterday morning, at this time, there’s already places that have seen 12 to 15 inches in the low country of South Carolina. So safe to say, this is going to be one of the wettest weeks that most places in eastern North and South Carolina have ever seen.”
Why is this storm so slow moving?
“It’s really run into a roadblock as it’s been moving northward. There’s high pressure off to the east, there’s high pressure off to the west, and there’s a cold front that’s becoming stationary to the north. So as Debbie has moved into that environment, it’s really stuck between those three systems, and it’s going to take until later on this week, maybe Friday or Saturday, before that slow moving front finally starts to shift off to the east.”