Alert archive / South Carolina
Weather alerts in South Carolina, 2008
2,093 weather alerts in 2008, from the National Weather Service and the Storm Prediction Center. An alert counts here when it covered any part of the state, so the counties below add up to more than the state.
Weather alerts by county
Each county as a circle sized by its count in 2008. Tap one for its archive.
- Alerts
- 2,093
- Warnings
- 1,270
- Watches
- 105
- Advisories
- 544
- Busiest month
- June389 alerts
- Busiest day
- March 15, 200872 alerts
Over time
By month
Warning verification
How often warnings here had a storm report inside them, and how much warning the reports had.
39 of 114 tornado warnings covering South Carolina in 2008 had a tornado report inside them; 51 of 62 tornado reports fell inside a warning, on average 22 minutes after it went out.
South Carolina, 2008
| Warnings | With a report | False alarm ratio | Reports | Inside a warning | Mean lead time | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tornado warnings | 114 | 39 | 66% | 62 | 82% | 22 min |
| Severe thunderstorm warnings | 778 | 382 | 51% | 822 | 75% | 23 min |
| Flash flood warnings | 27 | 16 | 41% | 51 | 84% | 81 min |
Each office's whole area, 2008
| Warnings | With a report | False alarm ratio | Reports | Inside a warning | Mean lead time | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| NWS Charleston, SC: tornado warnings | 63 | 13 | 79% | 33 | 85% | 24 min |
| NWS Charleston, SC: severe thunderstorm warnings | 346 | 181 | 48% | 457 | 77% | 23 min |
| NWS Charleston, SC: flash flood warnings | 21 | 12 | 43% | 40 | 88% | 99 min |
| NWS Greenville-Spartanburg, SC: tornado warnings | 59 | 18 | 69% | 29 | 79% | 25 min |
| NWS Greenville-Spartanburg, SC: severe thunderstorm warnings | 425 | 241 | 43% | 475 | 76% | 26 min |
| NWS Greenville-Spartanburg, SC: flash flood warnings | 32 | 21 | 34% | 43 | 86% | 82 min |
| NWS Columbia, SC: tornado warnings | 43 | 19 | 56% | 26 | 85% | 17 min |
| NWS Columbia, SC: severe thunderstorm warnings | 263 | 115 | 56% | 259 | 73% | 21 min |
| NWS Columbia, SC: flash flood warnings | 13 | 7 | 46% | 21 | 71% | 26 min |
| NWS Wilmington, NC: tornado warnings | 15 | 6 | 60% | 15 | 73% | 9 min |
| NWS Wilmington, NC: severe thunderstorm warnings | 176 | 83 | 53% | 176 | 78% | 20 min |
An office's figures cover every county it serves, including across state lines.
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 alerts
2,093 alerts are too many to list on one page. Narrow it to a product above, to a month in the chart, or to a county.
By product
Every kind of product issued here, grouped by hazard. Each opens the same place narrowed to that product.
By county
Every county with at least one alert. A county page lists each alert that covered it.
- Berkeley County299
- Colleton County249
- Dorchester County227
- Richland County208
- Charleston County203
- Lexington County192
- Calhoun County190
- Hampton County184
- Sumter County177
- Aiken County175
- Kershaw County168
- Fairfield County165
- Bamberg County164
- York County163
- Jasper County163
- Barnwell County161
- Chesterfield County161
- Clarendon County161
- Lee County157
- Beaufort County156
- Chester County155
- Cherokee County151
- Edgefield County150
- Newberry County150
- Union County146
- Allendale County142
- Anderson County140
- Saluda County139
- Marion County139
- Laurens County134
- McCormick County134
- Florence County128
- Abbeville County126
- Dillon County126
- Greenwood County121
- Horry County121
- Marlboro County120
- Orangeburg County120
- Darlington County114
- Williamsburg County105
The busiest days
Days with the most alerts issued, by UTC date.
Nearby
Alerts in force nowTornadoes on recordThe radar archive20072009
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.