White: No new hurricane headed our way anytime soon

Hurricane Helene cut a swath of destruction across western North Carolina Friday morning, but fortunately, she was a solo act.

Despite what some Facebook sites say, another devastating storm is not headed our way any time soon.

Burke County 911 Assistant Director Chris White, who also runs Foothills Action Network, one of the area’s most popular and accurate weather sites, said there is no evidence another storm is brewing.

“There’s a lot of Facebook pages out there of people who want to make a name for themselves, and they use times like this when people are down on their luck,” White said. “It creates clicks, and it creates hype, but it also creates panic in people’s nerves that are already very thin because of the ongoing situation.

“When cell phone service comes back up and the first thing they see is, oh, it’s another hurricane, it causes a panic, and it spreads like wildfire. I think it’s important to denounce that.”

White said the forecast calls for only a tiny amount of rain in the foreseeable future.

“We’re watching it, and we’ll continue to watch it,” White said. “The tropic season is not over until Nov. 30. But it’s also important to note that for the 10-day ensemble forecast — which takes 90-plus models and puts them together — the mean rainfall (forecast) is a quarter of an inch over the next 10 days. It’s not this 30-inch stuff that people are throwing out there.

“People have enough to worry about without having to fret over a storm that’s non-existent.”

A veteran weather observer, White said the severity of the storm was not a surprise.

“I saw that it was going to be a catastrophic event, and it was nothing short of that,” White said, adding he told family members who live on Powerhouse Road below the dam on Lake James to evacuate two days before the hurricane hit.

Their homes were later destroyed by flood waters.

“This is the most devastating storm that I can remember,” White said. “If you take Hugo and Francis and put them together, this is what you have. You’re talking about 30 inches of rain on the mountain, and you have 60 to 65 mph winds, some 70 mph wind gusts sporadically, then you’ve got big problems.”

Despite the devastation, White is determined to learn from Helene.

“We’ll get through it, and we’ll learn and adapt and be better off next time,” he said.