Alert archive / North Carolina / Lee County

Severe Thunderstorm Warnings in Lee County, North Carolina

452 severe thunderstorm warnings since 1986. An alert counts here when it covered this county. The archive of severe thunderstorm warnings reaches back to 1986.

Lee County and its neighbors

Each county as a circle sized by its count since 1986. Tap one for its archive.

Severe Thunderstorm Warnings
452
Busiest year
200832 severe thunderstorm warnings
Average year
11over 40 years on file

Over time

By year

Before October 2007 these were issued for whole counties, and a storm crossing three counties was often three warnings; since then one polygon follows the storm. The count changed with the practice, not only with the weather.

Warning verification

How often warnings here had a storm report inside them, and how much warning the reports had.

From 2008 to 2025, 88% of hail, wind and damage reports in Lee County fell inside a severe thunderstorm warning issued on average 21 minutes before, and 21% of the severe thunderstorm warnings had no report inside them.

Severe thunderstorm warnings by year

WarningsWith a reportFalse alarm ratioReportsInside a warningMean lead time
2008322134%2181%28 min
2009151033%5100%16 min
201014843%9100%24 min
2011201810%2295%19 min
2012201620%9100%21 min
2013660%1070%11 min
201410910%580%17 min
2015171135%667%24 min
2016191332%540%38 min
201711827%771%10 min
2018171324%683%25 min
2019252212%9100%19 min
2020171418%786%11 min
202113931%4100%28 min
2022292610%683%17 min
2023262312%7100%24 min
202416156%9100%26 min
2025292417%15100%21 min

Years from 2008, the first full year of storm-based warnings. The year still running is on its own page.

Verified by the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's Cow, which matches each storm-based warning with the local storm reports inside its polygon while it was in force, within 15 km of its edge: a tornado warning counts as verified on a tornado report, a severe thunderstorm warning on hail of 1 inch or more, a gust of 58 mph or more, or wind damage, a flash flood warning on a flash flood report. The false alarm ratio is the share of warnings with no such report; "inside a warning" is the probability of detection, the share of reports that fell inside one; lead time runs from the warning's issue to each report inside it, counting zero for a report that came first. A warning with no report is not proof nothing happened: reports come from spotters, the public and damage surveys, and are thin where few people live.

The latest severe thunderstorm warnings

The most recent on file, newest first.

IssuedProductOfficeLasted
Sep 18, 4:26 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH37 min
Sep 18, 4:10 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH50 min
Sep 18, 3:44 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH46 min
Sep 5, 4:12 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH18 min
Sep 5, 4:10 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH50 min
Aug 21, 6:28 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm Warning Considerable damage threatRAH47 min
Aug 21, 5:23 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH67 min
Aug 16, 1:52 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH38 min
Jul 12, 9:44 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH46 min
Jul 8, 10:08 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH24 min
Jul 8, 5:37 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH53 min
Jul 7, 8:39 PM EDTSevere Thunderstorm WarningRAH36 min

Nearby

Alerts in force nowTornadoes on recordForecastThe radar archive

Sources

National Weather Service watches, warnings, advisories and statements from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet's VTEC archive, which reconstructs tornado, severe thunderstorm, flash flood and marine warnings back to 1986 from the NWS text archive. Storm Prediction Center watches and mesoscale discussions from SPC's archive through the Mesonet. County centers from the US Census Bureau. Warning verification from the Mesonet's Cow. Rebuilt daily.