If was, at bare minimum, a category 2 hurricane once it reached the upstate of SC. I watched mature oak trees bend over during this storm. This is the fastest moving hurricane I have ever witnessed. I will not believe the lie that it was merely a "Tropical Storm". We have had many in the past, nothing like this.
Most of the time, it's a slow moving, soaking rain that had occasional wind gusts that could reach 60mph or so. Not safe to be out in, but nothing that would cause almost 100% power outages in counties. Something is definitely not what it seems.
Why were most of our resources sent to Florida? Why not better preparations beforehand? If these people can predict landfall of a hurricane weeks out, what stops them from giving a higher warning level? You can't prepare emergency service this way.
Feel free to add any additional context or opinions. A lot to question here and many things already brought up.
The 'lie' is where is FEMA and how are they not in every state within 24 hours, like hundreds of linemen that prepare for this?
Don't count on FEMA. They came to our area a few years ago after tornados. Apparently their "payout/ cheap interest loans" are based on how many millions of dollars of damage is done. 90 homes of low income people won't make it to their lower limit, so they get nothing. 3 millionaires houses will go over the limit, so they get help.
Truth!
I’ve been a federally licensed storm chaser for 28 years and in no way is this scenario possible. It’s absolutely manufactured from the hurricane hunters seeding and growing it right off the coast over the water. It’s not hard at all for them to do this. This needs to be the last time.
This is what I observed (and read other people's observations...people who know a lot more about storms than me):
People were commenting how the windspeed measurements at landfall were nowhere near Cat 4. Maybe this can be explained by elevation of measurement in the storm, I don't know. But NOAA predicted the landfall location pretty spot on, which happened to be a rural, sparsely populated area.
Pre-landfall, NOAA (NHC) showed the eye and cone of uncertainty heading pretty much due north to Atlanta (right over my house), then curving westward to end up in Nashville. They stuck to this path even when it was clear the storm went further east immediately after landfall. The NHC's last update (showing path, predicted windspeeds, etc) was at 11 pm, right at landfall. I don't believe they updated anything until the storm was already approaching SC. Windspeeds for Georgia were mild gusts (maybe 30-40 mph in the east of the state, Augusta, Savannah) and 80-90 in Atlanta. They never updated these numbers. When the storm hit Valdosta, about an hour after landfall, it was I believe Cat 2 strength, and was already outside NHC's cone of uncertainty. The storm kept heading NE, directly towards Augusta.
Looking at the spaghetti models, the NHC was the only one that really showed the storm going N, all the other models showed it going NE. But the NHC is who everybody follows, and apparently they had all the data from the other models, showing it going east, but chose to ignore it.
Augusta was hit head on by the eastern eyewall with Cat 1-2 winds, completely unexpectedly. Savannah got hit hard by the eastern part of the storm (the worst place to be), but the storm was a lot stronger than predicted because it was 150 miles east of where it was supposed to be. Nobody was warned about the closeness of the storm. The Greenville NWS was apparently the only weather center actually paying attention, and sent out warnings, but everyone was asleep. It then ravaged SC, and headed up for a near-direct hit to NC, which was only predicted to get some outer winds and rain (and not nearly as much rain as they got). Pre-landfall, there were warnings in NC about flooding, but I don't think anybody imagined the magnitude of what they were hit with.
Throughout this whole time, I watched the NHC's prediction, and they just moved the starting point of the cone of uncertainty to where the hurricane was at various points. It still, up to the time I went to bed at 5 am, showed the end point near Atlanta, and Accuweather and The Weather Channel said where I was should be getting 60 mph winds right then. It was completely calm outside. It's like they really wanted that storm to hit ATL. We got a little flooding in the city (mostly from the pre-storm cold front), but almost no winds where I am.
Mount Mitchell in NC registered 106 mph wind gusts. That is not a tropical storm. But I think they had "officially" downgraded it by that point.
My thoughts, they said the storm was Cat 4 at landfall, which it may or may not have been, but of course they want to push the narrative that we're having more frequent, stronger storms, because of "climate change," so I wouldn't be surprised if they fudged the data a bit. Yes, there was quite a bit of damage in FL, but people were prepared there, and the storm winds weren't measured as high as a Cat 4, as far as I've seen people reporting. Then, they wanted people in east GA, SC, and especially NC to be completely unprepared for the magnitude of what they were about to be hit with. And yes, the storm moved way faster than one would think a storm should move.
In my opinion, it was at the very least negligence, or overconfidence in their model. But it seemed very deliberate and suspicious how they never updated the path of the storm to reflect its actual path, leaving the hardest hit areas completely blindsided, and us up in Atlanta terrified of a storm that never came.
I'm in Marietta. We were hunkered down and expected the worst, since we have tons of huge trees all around our house. I was so relieved it didn't hit us, but I really feel for the people who were hit. I grew up in east TN and my grandparents lived outside of Asheville and we went there a lot, so I'm pretty familiar with the area. My parents went to Chimney Rock NC just two weeks ago. They love the place. My Mom was heartbroken when I sent her the news it was wiped off the map. I hope your son is doing ok and can get to the resources he needs.
We are just outside of Athens and only experienced rain…which we badly needed since it’s been so dry. No strong wind at all. This was Thursday. By Friday the rain was gone and the sun was out by afternoon. Strange.
Someone from GA made a comment to another post that they were watching the weather reports and comparing it to what was actually happening and it seemed (to me, based on their writing) that the NOAA was sticking to a script. The comment is the longest one to this post https://greatawakening.win/p/1995H041B3/nc-is-a-disaster-zone-and-the-wh/. Decide for yourself.
That was me. I'll post more details in this thread.