Kevin Myatt

Latest entries from the Weather Journal blog

• Weather Journal remains on break
• Coastal low prompts Southwest Virginia flooding
• Hurricane Ida: Something extraordinary may be happening

About Kevin

Kevin Myatt grew up in Arkansas to the tune of tornado sirens and the rhythm of hailstones, aspiring to be a meteorologist before his studies and career were turned to journalism instead. Though he often chases storms, he prefers living in the cooler, more tranquil weather of the Blue Ridge. He moved to Roanoke in 1999 to take a job on the copy desk of The Roanoke Times; writing headlines and editing copy is his principal work for the newspaper today.

Each May, Kevin assists Pulaski County High School / Virginia Tech meteorology instructor Dave Carroll in leading college and high school students to the Plains to observe severe weather firsthand. The accounts of many of his storm chases can be found here on the storm chasing page of his weather blog on roanoke.com.

Kevin was an editor for "Hurricanes and the Middle Atlantic States," a book written by D.C.-area weather enthusiast Rick Schwartz and published by Blue Diamond Books that documents hurricanes striking the mid-Atlantic states since colonial times.

The Weather Journal column began in 2003 and appears on Friday's Virginia section front in The Roanoke Times. The Weather Journal blog began in 2006 and follows weather day-by-day between the larger columns.

Jeanne built on what Frances started

Steep mountains, stationary fronts and storms with names don't mix.

They didn't mix in November 1985, when the remnants of Hurricane Juan rode a stationary front into our mountains and sent the Roanoke River into the City Market. They didn't mix on Tuesday morning, when the tropical depression formerly known as Hurricane Jeanne slid up a stationary front into Southwest Virginia, spinning out squalls of rain that put rivers and creeks into living rooms and lobbies.

For all time, the flood of Sept. 28, 2004 — the Roanoke River's seventh biggest on record -- will be known as the Jeanne flood. But it would be a mistake to consider Tuesday's historic flooding the product of only one storm. In truth, it is the Frances-Jeanne flood, with a little assistance from Ivan.

Jeanne's rain totals across the area were similar to those of Frances -- some places got more, some got less, but the average rainfall and the area coverage were similar. The floods of Jeanne would not have happened had Frances never happened. Frances took a dry ground and soaked it. Frances took low creeks and filled them up, some over their banks.

Three weeks later, when Jeanne arrived, the ground had not dried out, and the waterways had not retreated to their pre-Frances levels, thanks in part to a short but vigorous burst of rain from Ivan in between. If Frances had not happened three weeks earlier, Jeanne would have barely put the Roanoke River out of its banks, covering some parks, the Ramada Inn parking lot, perhaps the field at Victory Stadium.

Together, Frances, Jeanne and Ivan have apparently set a new September rainfall record for Roanoke Regional Airport at 11.72 inches, beating the September 1987 record of 11.09, according to data from the Southeast Regional Climate Center. November 1985 holds the all-time montly rainfall record at 12.36 inches.

Just as they were on a path from Stuart, Fla., to just north of Tampa Bay, Frances and Jeanne were a tag team in Virginia, too. Just as Jeanne scattered the debris left by Frances in Florida while also adding more severe damage, so Jeanne built on Frances' foundation in Virginia and add to it.

Seeing what Jeanne was able to do three weeks after Frances, we can be thankful that Ivan did not stall over us, as was feared, only 11 days after Frances. Where Jeanne was a disaster, Ivan could have been a catastrophe. Ivan was bad enough with its tornadoes. In the tornado realm, Frances and Ivan were the tag team, spinning off more than 100 each. In all of U.S. recorded weather history, only three hurricanes have spun off more than 100 tornadoes. Two of them happened within 11 days.

But in many ways, Jeanne was truly the cruelest of them all. As a tropical storm over Haiti, Jeanne poured rain on the denuded hillsides of a Third World country, killing more than 1,500. Next, Jeanne cruelly taunted storm-exhausted Florida, looping in the ocean long enough to make people almost forget her. Then, Jeanne roared west decisively, re-destroying areas that has at least got some tarps and makeshift boards up after Frances.

Finally, Jeanne awoke us with rain pelting on our windows and water flowing into our basements. Just like Frances three weeks before. And Juan in 1985. Agnes in 1972. Fran in 1996. Storms with names always get our attention, or at least they should. Did we go to sleep a bit after Ivan didn't lift an ark to Mount Ararat? Did we doubt some when the flood watches went out on Monday? Until I saw the radar pattern on Monday night, I had my doubts about Jeanne.

Far out in the Atlantic, Tropical Storm Lisa is being caught up in a changing weather pattern and will be ejected into distant cold waters to die a slow death. Some days from now, perhaps what's left of Lisa will be a cold, gusty drizzle in Scotland or Norway. There will likely -- finally -- be no storms with names anywhere in the Atlantic Ocean.

Nameless cold fronts and high pressure systems will be most welcome.