Live from the National Weather Service

North Carolina Storm Alerts

Active National Weather Service hail, wind, thunderstorm, tornado, tropical and winter storm alerts covering North Carolina, with the counties each one names and the office that issued it — plus what the state’s severe-weather season looks like and how each of these events actually damages a roof.

Below that, in its own lane, the smoke and fire family: fire weather, dense smoke, air quality, blowing dust and volcanic ashfall.

5 active alerts · read from the National Weather Service at Oct 10, 7:44 AM EDT · refreshed every 10 minutes

This page is informational and is not a safety resource. It exists to show roofing professionals where storm damage has been reported, and it is refreshed on a ten-minute cycle, so it can lag the Weather Service.

During an active weather event, the authority is weather.gov and your local emergency management agency. Follow them, not this page.

Active storm alerts in North Carolina

Reproduced exactly as the National Weather Service issued them. Alerts frequently cross state lines, so a county list may name counties in a neighbouring state. Smoke and fire alerts are reported separately, in their own lane below.

High Wind Warning

SevereUrgencyExpectedCertaintyLikely

Issued by NWS Morristown TN

In effect from Oct 10, 2:32 AM local · until Oct 11, 8:00 AM local

Counties named in this alert

Cherokee
Clay
Johnson
Cocke Smoky Mountains
Southeast Greene
Unicoi
Southeast Carter
Blount Smoky Mountains
Sevier Smoky Mountains
Southeast Monroe
East Polk
Russell
Washington

Read the full National Weather Service text

NWS headline

High Wind Warning issued October 10 at 2:32AM EDT until October 11 at 8:00AM EDT by NWS Morristown TN

NWS description

* WHAT...East winds 20 to 35 mph with gusts up to 70 mph expected, especially in the higher elevations. * WHERE...Portions of southwest North Carolina, east Tennessee, and southwest Virginia. * WHEN...Until 8 AM EDT Sunday. * IMPACTS...Damaging winds will blow down trees and power lines. Widespread power outages are expected. Travel will be difficult, especially for high profile vehicles. * ADDITIONAL DETAILS...This set up is likely to produce high winds along the eastern TN mountains and foothills. Lower terrain will likely see lesser impacts.

NWS instructions

People are urged to secure loose objects that could be blown around or damaged by the wind.

View this alert on weather.gov

High Wind Warning

SevereUrgencyExpectedCertaintyLikely

Issued by NWS Greenville-Spartanburg SC

In effect from Oct 10, 2:38 AM local · until Oct 11, 8:00 AM local

Counties named in this alert

Madison
Yancey
Mitchell
Swain
Haywood
Buncombe
Graham
Northern Jackson
Macon
Southern Jackson
Transylvania

Read the full National Weather Service text

NWS headline

High Wind Warning issued October 10 at 2:38AM EDT until October 11 at 8:00AM EDT by NWS Greenville-Spartanburg SC

NWS description

* WHAT...For the High Wind Warning in high elevations above 3500 feet, southeast winds 15 to 25 mph with gusts up to 60 mph expected. For the Wind Advisory in lower elevations below 3500 feet, southeast winds 10 to 20 mph with gusts of 45 to 50 mph expected. * WHERE...A portion of western North Carolina. * WHEN...Until 8 AM EDT Sunday. * IMPACTS...Damaging winds will blow down trees and power lines especially in higher elevations. Widespread power outages are expected in higher elevations. Travel will be difficult, especially for high profile vehicles. Gusty winds will blow around unsecured objects, and may cause a few tree limbs to fall and cause isolated power outages in lower elevations.

NWS instructions

Remain in the lower levels of your home during the windstorm, and avoid windows. Watch for falling debris and tree limbs. Use caution if you must drive. Stay tuned to further developments by listening to your local radio, television, or NOAA Weather Radio for further information. Winds this strong can make driving difficult, especially for high profile vehicles. Use extra caution.

View this alert on weather.gov

Wind Advisory

ModerateUrgencyExpectedCertaintyLikely

Issued by NWS Greenville-Spartanburg SC

In effect from Oct 10, 2:38 AM local · until Oct 11, 8:00 AM local

Counties named in this alert

Rabun
Habersham
Stephens
Franklin
Hart
Elbert
Avery
Henderson
Caldwell Mountains
Burke Mountains
McDowell Mountains
Rutherford Mountains
Polk Mountains
Anderson
Abbeville
Greenwood
Oconee Mountains
Pickens Mountains
Greenville Mountains
Greater Oconee
Greater Pickens
Central Greenville
Southern Greenville

Read the full National Weather Service text

NWS headline

Wind Advisory issued October 10 at 2:38AM EDT until October 11 at 8:00AM EDT by NWS Greenville-Spartanburg SC

NWS description

* WHAT...East winds 10 to 20 mph with gusts up to 46 mph expected. * WHERE...Portions of northeast Georgia, western North Carolina, and Upstate South Carolina. * WHEN...Until 8 AM EDT Sunday. * IMPACTS...Gusty winds will blow around unsecured objects including portable tents. Tree limbs could be blown down and a few power outages may result.

NWS instructions

Winds this strong can make driving difficult, especially for high profile vehicles. Use extra caution. Stay tuned to further developments by listening to your local radio, television, or NOAA Weather Radio for further information.

View this alert on weather.gov

Wind Advisory

ModerateUrgencyExpectedCertaintyLikely

Issued by NWS Greenville-Spartanburg SC

In effect from Oct 10, 2:38 AM local · until Oct 11, 8:00 AM local

Counties named in this alert

Madison
Yancey
Mitchell
Swain
Haywood
Buncombe
Graham
Northern Jackson
Macon
Southern Jackson
Transylvania

Read the full National Weather Service text

NWS headline

Wind Advisory issued October 10 at 2:38AM EDT until October 11 at 8:00AM EDT by NWS Greenville-Spartanburg SC

NWS description

NWS instructions

View this alert on weather.gov

Wind Advisory

ModerateUrgencyExpectedCertaintyLikely

Issued by NWS Blacksburg VA

In effect from Oct 10, 5:00 PM local · until Oct 11, 11:00 AM local

Counties named in this alert

Ashe
Watauga
Tazewell
Smyth
Grayson
Mercer
Summers
Western Greenbrier

Read the full National Weather Service text

NWS headline

Wind Advisory issued October 10 at 1:24AM EDT until October 11 at 11:00AM EDT by NWS Blacksburg VA

NWS description

* WHAT...East winds 15 to 25 mph with gusts up to 55 mph expected. * WHERE...In North Carolina, Ashe and Watauga Counties. In Virginia, Grayson, Smyth, and Tazewell Counties. In West Virginia, Mercer, Summers, and Western Greenbrier Counties. * WHEN...From 5 PM this afternoon to 11 AM EDT Sunday. * IMPACTS...Gusty winds will blow around unsecured objects. Tree limbs could be blown down and a few power outages may result. * ADDITIONAL DETAILS...Strong easterly to southeasterly winds from the remnants of Isaias will move over the region today into Sunday, which may lead to downed trees and power poles and subsequently power outages across higher terrain locations from NW North Carolina to SE West Virginia.

NWS instructions

Winds this strong can make driving difficult, especially for high profile vehicles. Use extra caution. Secure outdoor objects.

View this alert on weather.gov

Radar over North Carolina

Straight from radar.weather.gov and regenerated by NOAA roughly every two minutes.

National Weather Service radar for the Southeast, covering North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida and Alabama. — Where precipitation is falling over North Carolina right now. The National Weather Service publishes these mosaics by region rather than by state, so the frame runs past the state line and neighbouring states are visible in it. Radar shows precipitation, not damage — a return over a county is not evidence that any particular building was hit.
Radar imagery: the National Weather Service. Served directly from radar.weather.gov, a free US Government service, and regenerated by NOAA roughly every two minutes — your browser picks up new frames on its own. This site does not process, re-colour or re-time the imagery; it is the Weather Service’s own mosaic, unmodified. weather.gov
This radar is informational and is not a safety resource. During an active weather event, the authority is weather.gov and your local emergency management agency. Follow them, not this page.

Smoke & fire lane

Smoke & fire alerts in North Carolina

The National Weather Service issues a separate family of alerts for fire weather, dense smoke, air quality, blowing dust and volcanic ashfall. This lane reports that family for North Carolina, kept apart from the storm alerts above because the two answer different questions.

Wildfire smoke is what drives smoke-damage losses, and it reaches a building through the same vents that keep an attic dry — which is why it belongs on a roofing page at all. Alerts describing particulate already in the air are listed ahead of fire-weather forecasts; that ordering is this lane’s own and is not a Weather Service ranking.

0 active smoke or fire alerts · read from the National Weather Service at Oct 10, 7:44 AM EDT · refreshed every 10 minutes

No active smoke or fire alerts

The National Weather Service has no active fire weather, dense smoke, air quality, blowing dust or volcanic ashfall alerts covering North Carolina as of this refresh.

An empty list here is the ordinary reading, not a fault and not a gap in the data. Most of the country carries nothing in this family on most days, and this lane fills itself the moment the Weather Service issues something.

The 12 alert types this lane reports

Every one is a National Weather Service product and is listed under the name the Weather Service gives it. Grouping them into families is ours; the names are not.

Fire weather: Fire WarningExtreme Fire DangerRed Flag WarningFire Weather Watch
Dense smoke: Dense Smoke Advisory
Air quality: Air Quality Alert
Blowing dust: Blowing Dust WarningDust Storm WarningBlowing Dust AdvisoryDust Advisory
Volcanic ashfall: Ashfall WarningAshfall Advisory

The Weather Service defines each of these products and this site does not attempt to. What any one of them means, and the criteria an office issues it under, are at weather.gov.

This lane is informational and is not a safety resource. It reports which National Weather Service smoke and fire alerts are active and where, on a ten-minute refresh cycle, so it can lag the Weather Service.

During an active weather event, the authority is weather.gov and your local emergency management agency. Follow them, not this page.

Smoke exposure and air quality are health matters, and this page does not address them. It does not tell you whether it is safe to be outdoors or to work, what an air quality index number means for you or for anyone in your household, or what respiratory protection to use. Those questions belong with a clinician and with the agency that issued the alert. The federal air-quality authority is airnow.gov.

What smoke does to a roof assembly

An active alert is a record of conditions, not a finding about any building. These are the standing references on the building-assembly side of a smoke or fire loss.

Smoke odor in roof decking and attic insulationWhy odor outlives the visible repairs — deposition into bare decking and framing, insulation acting as a reservoir, and the difference between cleaning, sealing and removing. The article that covers wildfire smoke reaching an attic through the vents, with the roof itself untouched.Fire damage to a roof assemblyDirect flame against radiant heat, shingle distortion and mat delamination, charred sheathing and loss of section, and why a roof that looks intact from the ground can still be condemned.Roof replacement after a fireHow the repair-or-replace decision is built on a fire loss: partial against full deck replacement, the boundary between charred and heat-affected wood, matching, and the code upgrades a repair can trigger.Ventilation holes and fire department roof damageFire crews cut the roof on purpose. What vertical ventilation is for, how tactical damage is separated from fire damage in a scope, and what an opened deck needs in the meantime.Smoke Mitigation Network — directory listingLaboratory smoke damage testing and documentation, listed under Restoration & Mitigation → Smoke Damage Testing & Assessment. Whether a building is contaminated is established by sampling rather than by looking at it. The listing discloses that it shares ownership with this directory.

Severe weather season in North Carolina

Peak season

March–May and August–October

North Carolina is unusual in carrying three separate roofing seasons across one state. Spring brings severe thunderstorms with hail and damaging straight-line wind through the Piedmont. From late summer into autumn the coast and coastal plain are exposed to Atlantic tropical systems — NOAA dates the season June 1 to November 30, peaking from mid-August into October — which weaken as they track inland but still deliver hours of wind and wind-driven rain. The mountains then add a winter season of snow loading and freezing rain.

Seasons describe a pattern, not a schedule. The National Weather Service issues these products year-round, and the live list above is the only authority on what is actually running in North Carolina right now.

What NOAA has recorded in North Carolina

The archived record, not the live feed. Severe weather logged by the National Centers for Environmental Information over the covered years, split into the events NOAA keys to a county and the events it keys to a forecast zone.

Between 2016 and 2026, NOAA recorded 8,625 county-level severe-weather events across North Carolina: 6,805 thunderstorm wind events, 1,479 hail reports, 339 tornadoes and 2 tropical storm events. Of the 1,479 hail reports carrying a measured size, 1,136 were 1.00 in across or larger.

A further 2,055 events over the same period were recorded against National Weather Service forecast zones rather than counties — 736 winter storms, 369 tropical storm events, 342 high wind events, 265 heavy snow events and 255 strong wind events. A forecast zone is not a county: it can span several or subdivide one, so these are reported here at state level and appear in no county total on this site.

County-keyed events

8,625

2016–2026

Zone-keyed events

2,055

statewide, not county-attributable

Hail 1.00 in or larger

1,136

of 1,479 sized hail reports

Tornadoes

339

in the county record

Counties with the heaviest record

Ranked by the number of county-keyed events NOAA recorded, 2016–2026. 100 of North Carolina’s counties carry a record in this dataset.

Wake County457largest hail 2.75 in (Softball+) · peak gust 66 kt (about 76 mph)
Randolph County236largest hail 1.75 in (Golf Ball) · peak gust 50 kt (about 58 mph)
Guilford County216largest hail 2.00 in (Baseball) · peak gust 56 kt (about 64 mph)
Forsyth County215largest hail 1.75 in (Golf Ball) · peak gust 54 kt (about 62 mph)
Surry County195largest hail 1.75 in (Golf Ball) · peak gust 74 kt (about 85 mph)
Rockingham County191largest hail 2.00 in (Baseball) · peak gust 70 kt (about 81 mph)
Wilkes County180largest hail 2.75 in (Softball+) · peak gust 83 kt (about 96 mph)
Johnston County178largest hail 1.50 in (Ping Pong Ball) · peak gust 50 kt (about 58 mph)

Preliminary — not yet in the permanent archive

1,096 further preliminary storm reports have been filed against North Carolina counties since June 1, 2026. They are counted separately from every archived figure above and are not added to any of them.

Preliminary reports covering 2026-05-31 onward come from National Weather Service storm reports filed as events occur. They have not yet been through the quality-control review that produces the permanent archive, and individual reports may later be revised, combined or withdrawn.

County figures and state figures. County figures count events NOAA recorded against a county (hail, thunderstorm wind and tornadoes). High wind, winter storms, ice storms, blizzards, heavy snow, hurricanes and tropical storms are recorded against National Weather Service forecast zones rather than counties, so they are reported at state level instead. Counts reflect events that were observed and reported. NOAA does occasionally record one of those against a county instead. Where it has, the event sits in the county-keyed total above rather than the zone-keyed one — in North Carolina that applies to tropical storm events.

Source. Archived figures come from the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information Storm Events Database, covering 2016 through May 31, 2026. Reports after that date come from NOAA Storm Prediction Center preliminary storm reports. Both are US Government works in the public domain. This is a record of past weather; the live alert list at the top of this page is the only authority on what is running in North Carolina now.

What these storms do to a roof

The damage mechanisms that matter in North Carolina, in the order they generate work here.

Hail

Hail damages an asphalt shingle in two ways at once. The impact knocks granules off the surface, and it can bruise or fracture the asphalt mat underneath without breaking the surface open. Granules are what shield the asphalt from ultraviolet light, so a roof that has lost them ages faster from that point on. A fractured mat is the reason hail damage is often described as latent: the roof may not leak the week of the storm, and the failure shows up later. On metal panels and metal accessories, hail leaves dents, which raises the separate question of whether the damage is cosmetic or has actually compromised the panel or its coating.

Straight-line wind

Wind damage on a shingle roof usually starts as a broken seal rather than a missing shingle. Uplift pressure is highest at the edges — rakes, eaves, ridges and hips — and along any line where the roof plane changes, so that is where tabs lift and the factory sealant strip lets go first. Once the seal is broken, a shingle that still looks fine from the ground is no longer bonded to the course below it and every later wind event works on the same spot. Wind also drives debris, and impact damage from a branch or from another roof’s material is a separate mechanism from uplift.

Tropical systems

A tropical system combines two things an ordinary thunderstorm does not: wind that lasts for hours instead of minutes, and rain driven sideways into every seam at the same time. The duration matters because uplift is cumulative — a seal that survives one gust may not survive the same gust repeated for six hours. Wind-driven rain also finds its way through vents, ridge products, flashings and wall-to-roof transitions that shed ordinary vertical rain without difficulty. Inland states see the same mechanism at reduced strength when a system tracks in from the coast.

Ice storms

An ice storm coats a roof, and everything above it, in accreted ice. The weight on the roof itself is one part of it; the larger roofing consequence is usually what the same ice does to trees and limbs overhead, which then come down onto the covering. Ice accretion also works into any existing gap — a lifted shingle, an open seam, a tired flashing — and freeze-thaw cycling widens what it gets into.

Why the storm date matters

Property insurance works from a date of loss — a specific storm on a specific day over a specific area, not a general observation that a roof looks worn. That is why the county list and the effective and expiry times on each alert above are the useful part of this page: they are the National Weather Service’s own record that a given event covered a given county at a given time.

It also matters because hail damage is frequently latent. A fractured shingle mat can take a long time to become a leak, so the gap between the storm and the discovery can be considerable — and by then, establishing which storm did it is a records question rather than an observation. An alert naming a county is not evidence that any particular building was damaged; it is evidence of what the weather was doing over that county, which is where an assessment starts rather than where it ends.

Next steps in North Carolina

Roofing contractors in North CarolinaBrowse the North Carolina directory by city and county.North Carolina licensing rulesWhether roofers must be licensed here, which board issues it, and the bond and insurance rules.Storm damage roof repair guideHow hail and wind damage is identified, documented and repaired.National storm centerActive alerts across all 50 states and DC, busiest first.

Source: the National Weather Service. Every alert on this page comes from the NWS public alerts feed at api.weather.gov, a free US Government service, and is reproduced as the issuing office wrote it. The office that issued each alert is named on the alert itself.

This site does not edit, summarise or re-grade Weather Service text. Alerts are filtered into two separate lists — the event types that affect roofs, and the smoke, fire and airborne-particulate family — and each list is sorted. Nothing else is changed, and no alert is moved between the two lists to suit a heading.

weather.gov