Meck County Wall cloud....

About a quarter till 4pm, Jeff grabbed me and we took a look at a thunderstorm moving into Charlotte. Our camera on top of the Dowd YMCA had a great view of the storm, and we are pretty confident we were able to watch, as well as show you on live TV at 3:51 and 4:01, a wall cloud move just from just northwest of Center City to just north of Center City prior to falling apart. Sure enough, the storm was exhibiting some rotation. Thankfully, a tornado never touched down, but it was definitely impressive to watch.

Here is some time-lapse footage of that wall cloud approaching Uptown. This footage is property of News 14 Carolina.



Below is the reflectivity and velocity data from the GSP NEXRAD at the time...you can clearly see the small velocity couplet.

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This Evening....

Some strong to severe storms can't be ruled out around the Charlotte region through this evening, but it looks like most of that potential will remain south of the Triad region. However, many spots will again see at least some rain, and that is always welcome, especially when it comes down at a manageable pace.

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Storms Ready to Pop....

Looks like things are set to start rolling as far as storms are concerned. The atmosphere has become quite unstable across much of the Carolinas, and storms are already firing in the foothills.

I expect we will see a good number of severe weather warnings through this afternoon and this evening across the Piedmont of North Carolina. Keep it tuned to News 14 Carolina on television for all of the latest information.

Below is the CAPE chart from 1pm....pretty impressive values...and the CAPE should be even higher this hour.

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Some Severe Storms Today...

After a very active weather day yesterday, we are poised for another rather active day today. All is quiet as I am typing this around 12:15, but I think later this afternoon we will see a good coverage of showers and storm fire off. Just like yesterday, severe weather seems likely with damaging winds and large hail being possible. Also, heavy downpours and lots of lightning will accompany the storms. Keep it tuned to News 14 Carolina on television for all of the latest weather information.

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Showers and storms...

Looks like a good number of spots in the Charlotte viewing area will see a some showers and storms over the next few hours....frequent lightning and locally heavy rain will be likely with all storms.**Image above is from 3:26pm.**

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Major Hurricane Bertha....

Bertha rapidly strengthened today...max winds now at 115mph....below is a quick video discussion on Bertha I cut this evening.

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Hurricane Bertha

Bertha has strengthened to a hurricane this morning....the first one of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season. Bertha looks pretty healthy on satellite imagery this morning.

It continues to look more likely that Bertha will re-curve in the Atlantic before threatening the East coast. However, the threat to Bermuda is very much alive. It looks like the stronger the system is, the farther east the eventual track will be due to the incoming trough later in the week having a greater influence on the system. The weaker the system, the farther west it could track. Since Bertha is ahead of 'schedule' in terms of strength, the more eastern solutions seem a bit more likely right now.

Let me caution though...it is still too early to completely clear the East coast from any threat.....we will keep watching.

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