Radar
Two hours of observed radar plus short-range forecast frames, with active alert areas and live river gauges on the same map.
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11:10 AM
Why radar is unreliable in these mountains
The nearest NEXRAD sites are KGSP near Greer, South Carolina and KMRX near Morristown, Tennessee. Both are well outside the mountains and both scan across terrain that rises above the beam.
Two things follow. Ridges block the beam, leaving valleys behind them permanently under-reported. And because the beam climbs with distance, over the high country it is often sampling several thousand feet above the ground — so it can show nothing while snow is falling underneath it, or show precipitation that evaporates before it lands.
An empty radar return over a mountain valley is not evidence that it is dry there. Trust gauges, observations and your own window over radar in this terrain.
Legend
- Observed radar frames
- Nowcast frames, extrapolated
- River gauge — colour shows flood category, click for detail
Radar imagery from RainViewer. Basemap © OpenStreetMap contributors, © CARTO. Gauge colours repeat the flood categories used on the river pages, where each is also named in text.