FOX weather correspondents Robert Ray and Brandi Campbell walk down Main Street in Chimney Rock, North Carolina, a month after Hurricane Helen devastated the area, and walk through the streets of Chimney Rock, North Carolina, to celebrate the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season. Helen reflects on the disaster and the resilience of communities.
NEW YORK – The past 365 days have seen a number of extreme weather events, including powerful hurricanes and other natural disasters, that will leave significant impacts in 2024.
Hurricanes Milton, Helen, Debbie, and Beryl caused widespread destruction and loss of life. In addition to hurricanes, the year also saw severe flooding, a total solar eclipse, wildfires, and an intense heat wave. Some strange things have also made headlines this year.
Here are the 10 biggest weather stories we’ve seen on FOX Weather and foxweather.com this year.
1. Milton hits Florida with devastating tornadoes
Hurricane Milton made landfall near Siesta Key, Florida as a Category 3 storm on October 9 at 8:30 pm EDT. Milton approached the state as a devastating Category 5 hurricane before wind shear weakened it.
Despite weakening, the storm’s extensive wind field caused significant damage across east central Florida. The tornado outbreak spawned at least 19 confirmed tornadoes, with hurricane-force winds toppling trees and power lines and damaging numerous homes and businesses.
North of Milton, torrential rain of 10 to 15 inches (or more) caused localized flooding and rising river and stream levels.
Milton is believed to have killed at least 17 people in eight Florida counties.
Hurricane Milton left a trail of destruction across Florida from the Gulf Coast to the Space Coast, with damaging winds and dozens of tornadoes reported. FOX weather correspondent Robert Ray reports from Bradenton Beach, where the cleanup is underway.
2. Helen becomes a record-setting hurricane.
Hurricane Helen made landfall in the Big Bend area of Florida on September 26th. The storm moved rapidly at 20 miles per hour, rapidly moving across Georgia and the southern Appalachians, and subsided by September 29.
Helen brought unprecedented rainfall to the region, causing catastrophic flooding and widespread destruction, particularly in mountainous areas of western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee. The storm also caused large-scale power outages.
FOX Weather independently announced the death toll from Helen at 230 people in seven states, with 102 confirmed deaths in North Carolina alone.
Hurricane Helen hit western North Carolina more than two months ago. FOX Weather returned to the area this past weekend as the community continues to recover. Meteorologist Steve Bender spoke with victims and business owners about their progress.
3. Debbie’s wrath leaves 8 people dead in the Southeast
Hurricane Debbie formed from a tropical cyclone that developed near Cuba on August 2nd. It developed into a tropical depression on August 3rd and into a hurricane on August 4th. The storm made landfall near Steinhatchee, Florida on August 5th.
Debbie caused storm surge and wind damage, but the most significant impact was severe flooding. Torrential rains, particularly in Manatee and Sarasota counties, caused widespread flooding, road closures, and water rescues.
At least eight people were killed in the storm.
Hurricane Debbie made landfall near Steinhatchee, Florida on August 5th as a Category 1 cyclone. In the days after the hurricane made landfall, flooding was reported from the Sunshine State to Pennsylvania and New York.
4. Beryl hits Texas with a tornado.
Hurricane Beryl is a powerful and long-lasting storm that formed in the Atlantic Ocean on June 28th. It rapidly strengthened into a major hurricane and made landfall in Grenada and then Jamaica as a Category 4 storm. The hurricane struck the Yucatan Peninsula as a high-end Category 2 hurricane and later weakened to a tropical storm.
Once Braille entered the Gulf of Mexico, it became a hurricane again and made landfall in Texas. The eyewall moved across the Houston metropolitan area, causing extensive damage and leaving thousands of people without power for several days.
Tornado warnings were issued across the Texas-Arkansas-Louisiana border as Tropical Storm Beryl moved across the state.
5. Solar storm causes aurora borealis in Florida
After a massive solar flare hit Earth on May 10, skies across the United States were lit up with a level of spectacular, colorful glow not seen in years or even decades.
Usually confined to states along the Canadian border during typical geomagnetic storms, the aurora borealis appeared as far as the Gulf Coast, with pink, green and purple skies reported in Florida, Texas and Alabama.
NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center said the satellite observed conditions reaching Level 5 on the geomagnetic scale, making it the first storm to reach this level since October 2003.
Aurora viewers should keep an eye on the skies this weekend as solar flares from the sun are currently impacting Earth. Current forecasts indicate that this storm will continue across North America until Saturday morning.
6. Total solar eclipse in America will scare millions
More than a dozen states were in the path of a total solar eclipse that crossed the United States on April 8th. The eclipse began in Texas and moved northeast, leaving Maine. Cities along the route included Dallas, Texas, Little Rock, Arkansas, Indianapolis, Indiana, Cleveland, Ohio, and Buffalo, New York.
The next total solar eclipse that passes through part of the Lower Forty-Eight won’t occur until 2044.
FOX Weather’s Stephen Morgan brings us the fullness of the phenomenon and all the emotions as darkness descends on Dallas Monday afternoon. He will be joined by Carrie Black of the National Science Foundation. “This was a great experience,” he said.
7. Giant fireballs discovered in 12 states
What people in nearly a dozen states saw shortly after 1 a.m. on August 30th was not a bird or a plane. Instead, it was a fireball that lit up the sky and created the sound of a sonic boom.
The American Meteor Society said it had received more than 150 reports from people who had seen or heard the phenomenon, but NASA later classified it as a “very bright” fireball and classified it as a fairly rare phenomenon.
The space agency said the phenomenon began about 45 miles above Piney Flats, Tennessee, and moved southeast at an astonishing 31,300 miles per hour.
A fireball lights up the sky over Spruce Pine, North Carolina, on August 30th. (Video provided by Brian Coviello)
8. Cheetos ‘world-changing’ bag left in cave in New Mexico
Cheetos snack bags left in a cave in New Mexico’s Carlsbad Caverns National Park have led park officials to accuse the seemingly harmless trash of destroying a delicate underground ecosystem.
The bag of snacks was dropped into the Big Room, the largest single-cave chamber in North America by volume, NPS said.
Cheeto bag.
(Carlsbad Caverns National Park)
They said the leftover Cheetos provided an ideal environment for fungi and microorganisms to live, as the processed corn in the snacks became soft in the cave’s humidity.
“While a spilled snack bag may seem trivial from a human perspective, it can be a world-changing event for cave life,” park officials said. said.
9. Bison Gores South Carolina Woman in Yellowstone
On June 1, a bison bit an 83-year-old woman in Yellowstone National Park.
A visitor to Yellowstone National Park learned firsthand why it’s best to stay away from wild animals. The giant bison threatened to charge if you tried to touch its head.
Park paramedics rushed her to a local clinic and then transported her by helicopter to a hospital in Idaho. Doctors said she suffered serious injuries.
A woman from Greenville, South Carolina, got too close to a bison, according to the National Park Service.
“The bison defended its own space and approached within several feet of the female, lifting her approximately one foot off the ground with its antlers,” the NPS said in a statement.
10. A woman who took care of a “baby hedgehog” is shocked.
A concerned animal lover found himself a little confused after rescuing what he believed to be an injured creature he found on the side of the road.
A British woman discovered a small creature resembling a baby hedgehog on a footpath in March and eventually took it to the Lower Moss Wood Educational Reserve and Wildlife Hospital in Knutsford, England.
The hospital director thought it was unusual to see a baby hedgehog at this time of year, so he asked the woman to keep it warm and bring it in the morning.
Concerned animal lovers were left red-faced when it turned out that the baby hedgehog they had cared for overnight and rushed to the veterinary hospital was actually Bobble with a fluffy hat.
(via Janet Kotze, Kennedy News and Media)
The next day, the hospital director examines the creature and discovers that it is not a hedgehog, but a fluffy hat bobble.
Janet Kotze, head of the veterinary hospital, said: “The golden rule is that hedgehogs, especially such small hedgehogs, should not be allowed outside during the day, and apart from the fact that she is not a hedgehog, she did exactly the right thing. ” he said.
