From the managing editor, December 2021

Growing up in the mountains of Western North Carolina, I saw that people paid attention to signs as to what to expect for winter. I’m sure it’s the same for east Tennessee and the rest of the Southern Appalachian region.

In the Asheville area, we also grew up paying attention to Bob Caldwell, who was once the weather man at the local television station. 

Bob was from Madison County, up near Tennessee, and he knew that these mountains could generate special weather events that the National Weather Service couldn’t begin to understand on a micro level. Things can differ dramatically in a matter of a hundred yards or less here in the mountains, and Bob knew that. 

Especially in winter, Bob would begin the 11 p.m. local weather saying that the Weather Service was expecting x, or y, or z, but then, with a conspiratorial glance, he’d add, “those of us who have been here for a while” knew that the official forecast was probably off a bit, or a lot.

These mountains that ring us play havoc with fronts and boundaries. You can be standing in Waynesville watching storms approach from Sylva. It looks like the devil’s gonna start beating the drums in a few minutes, the clouds are so dark and threatening on the horizon. Yet, in five minutes they’ve shifted south and the storm is going towards Rosman or Brevard over in Transylvania County, and Haywood County skies may begin to clear.

Anyone who lives over in Transylvania County knows they get the rain. Transylvania County records more than 90 inches of rain annually, and is North Carolina’s wettest county.

But if you didn’t know how the storms track, then standing here in Waynesville you’d swear that those big clouds you see on the horizon are coming your way.

Much of our region sits in one of the nation’s few true temperate rainforests, though a lot of that is mountainous land that has few residents. That rain comes up from the south.

Don Hendershot, a naturalist and SML contributor who lives in Haywood County, wrote in our April 2012 edition: “The topography of the Southern Appalachians, coupled with prevailing winds from the south-southwest, join in a process known as orographic lift to create this bounty of precipitation. When these prevailing winds carrying moisture from the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean hit the mountains they are abruptly lifted up. This orographic lifting quickly cools the air mass, raising the humidity and often resulting in precipitation.”

Meaning, when it’s dry in other places, chances are it’s wet here, in all seasons.

A few years ago when I was editor of the weekly newspaper in Marshall, North Carolina, I decided to visit the western edge of Madison County during my first winter there, just to familiarize myself with that bit of the area. The forecast said it might snow over near the state line, but in Marshall the sun was shining.

I drove out through Hot Springs and took NC 209 down towards Trust and Luck, two of the region’s most promisingly named communities. (Nearby is the community of Joe, and farther west in Tennessee is Tom Town.)

At some point I chose to take a right turn towards the state line, chasing that elusive snow. When I made the turn, the road was dry. I swooped through a couple of uphill curves and BAM—suddenly it was pounding down snow and the edge of the road was white. Within 1,000 feet the road was covered. Within another 1,000 feet, five inches had accumulated and more was falling. 

It felt like I had driven into blizzard, but it was a normal snowfall there up near 4,000 feet in elevation.

I brought the car to a stop, but, trying to turn around, I got stuck. A friendly group of high school boys saw my travails and, laughing and smiling, pushed me out of a snowbank and back towards lower ground. I was thankful.

So yes, pay attention to the signs of weather here in the mountains. You never really know what’s around the next curve.

—Jonathan Austin