Western North Carolina was walloped by a sudden and severe storm the evening of June 28, with widespread power outages caused by downed trees.
The storm
Representatives from the National Weather Service were in Western North Carolina the morning of July 29 investigating whether or not a tornado was confirmed in the area Tuesday evening, meteorologist Christiaan Patterson told the Citizen Times July 29.
Patterson said that it is not common for tornadoes to form in the mountains, but it does happen.
The storm was linked to a larger regional pattern affecting the Southeast and involving Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina, Patterson said.
When asked about the AI-generated image shared by the National Weather Service,
Patterson declined to comment.
"Our main mission is to protect lives and property," she said.
Asheville
City of Asheville spokesperson Kim Miller told the Citizen Times July 29 that emergency crews had no reports of landslides, loss of life or sinkholes but worked through the night clearing downed trees and securing downed power lines until utility crews could respond. Of the 122 storm-related calls, 11% were for downed trees and 10% were for fire alarms that had been activated.
Madison County
Madison County Manager Rod Honeycutt told the Citizen Times July 29 that there had been no loss of life and no structural damage of buildings reported. All primary roads are open. Some secondary roads are still being cleared, and work crews are dealing with mudslides on Lonesome Mountain Road and Grapevine Road. The county’s most immediate concern, Honeycutt said, was the 750 or so Duke Energy customers who were still without power as of 10 a.m.
Weaverville
Weaverville Town Manager Scottie Harris told the Citizen Times July 28 he’d spoken with the town’s fire chief. During the hourlong storm, emergency crews responded to approximately 10 storm-related calls, mostly downed trees and power lines.
There was, however, significant impact to the county’s emergency phone system.
“We did have a loss of 911 capability for about 2 hours,” Honeycutt said, noting that backup systems performed as designed and that at no time were emergency calls going unanswered. The system, Honeycutt explained, rerouted calls to Chatham County officials, who would notify Madison County officials by phone or radio.
Power outages
Zach Vavricka, a Duke Energy spokesperson, said that the company was still dealing with "scattered" power outages the morning of July 29. An outage map shortly after noon showed 674 outages in the Asheville area, with "pockets of outages" in areas both east and west of Asheville. At the peak of the storm, more than 18,000 people were affected by outages, Vavricka said.
"But they are out today working hard to get everybody back on by tonight," Vavricka said.
Kara Fohner is the Public Safety Reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times. Email her at kfohner@usatodayco.com.
Cory Vaillancourt is the Helene Recovery/Investigations Reporter for the Asheville Citizen Times. Find him on X at @The_CoryV or on Signal, via email atcvaillancourt@citizentimes.com or at 912-508-5640.
This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Was it a tornado? Severe storm hits Western NC
