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North Carolina Goes Against National Dry Weather Trend

This past July was one of the hottest on record, the third-hottest in fact since 1895. Typically, hot goes along with dry, but in contrast to the rest of the country most of North Carolina is enjoying drought-free conditions. Ryan Boyles from the State Climate Office says much of the Piedmont has benefited from frequent afternoon thundershowers.

Ryan Boyles: Across Central NC and most of the state, we've seen some pretty heavy thunderstorms rolling through which is not too unusual. When you have high temps, you can also have a lot of instability. Once those storms develop, they explode very quickly and become intense very quickly and can produce an inch or more significant rain in a short period of time.

Boyles says the lone exception is Brunswick County in the extreme southern part of the state. It's the only county classified on the National Drought Map this week as being moderately dry. Twenty-four counties are considered abnormally dry. Those areas are mainly south of the Triangle and in the southwest toward Charlotte.

Gurnal Scott joined North Carolina Public Radio in March 2012 after several stops in radio and television. After graduating from the College of Charleston in his South Carolina hometown, he began his career in radio there. He started as a sports reporter at News/Talk Radio WTMA and won five Sportscaster of the Year awards. In 1997, Gurnal moved on to television as general assignment reporter and weekend anchor for WCSC-TV in Charleston. He anchored the market's top-rated weekend newscasts until leaving Charleston for Memphis, TN in 2002. Gurnal worked at WPTY-TV for two years before returning to his roots in radio. He joined the staff of Memphis' NewsRadio 600 WREC in 2004 eventually rising to News Director. In 2006, Raleigh news radio station WPTF came calling and he became the station's chief correspondent. Gurnal’s reporting has been honored by the South Carolina Broadcasters Association, the North Carolina Associated Press, and the Radio Television Digital News Association of the Carolinas.
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