On a Dark Night

Dixon Odom recalls that March 28, 1984, dawned as a “beautiful morning.”

“The sun was shining, it was warm,” says Odom, longtime fire chief in Bennettsville, S.C.

By the end of that day, Odom was helping oversee a recovery and rescue operation in what meteorologists consider the worst tornado outbreak in Carolinas history.

It happened 25 years ago today.

The National Weather Service says an outbreak of severe thunderstorms and possibly even tornadoes is expected somewhere in the Southeast today. The Charlotte metro region would be most at risk late this afternoon or this evening.

But forecasters say today's storm system pales in comparison to the one 25 years ago.

Charlotte escaped the fury of the 24 tornadoes that crushed the countryside that day on a path from the South Carolina-Georgia border, across the Palmetto State and then northward through the Sandhills and coastal plain of North Carolina.

By the time the last tornado moved into the Atlantic Ocean, 57 people were dead – 42 in North Carolina, 15 in South Carolina – and more than 800 injured.

“It was a classic major tornado outbreak,” says Lara Pagano, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Raleigh.

None of the two dozen twisters reached F5 level on the Fujita scale, the strongest classification of tornadoes. But there were seven F4 storms (winds of up to 260 mph), including a twister that rumbled through Bennettsville, where Odom was assistant fire chief at the time and on duty when the storms struck.

“We had been sounding our sirens since 2 in the afternoon, when they issued a tornado watch,” he recalls. “About 6:30 p.m., they issued a warning, so we started sounding a different siren alert.”

Odom says the storm was so loud that he couldn't hear the siren, which was a short distance up the street.

“A few minutes later, we started getting calls from the boys who live on the north side of town,” he says.

That is where the Northwoods Shopping Center stood. A milewide funnel cloud roared through the shopping center and a nearby apartment complex, leveling them in seconds. Most of the seven deaths and 100 injuries in the Bennettsville area happened there.

“We couldn't get to the scene from the center of town, because of the damage,” Odom recalls. “We got crews to arrive from the north, from Rockingham and Hamlet (in North Carolina's Richmond County).”

Odom called nearby Robeson County, across the border in North Carolina, and asked for help. But they were busy. Another F4 twister had hit there, damaging nearly every building in the Robeson County town of Red Springs.

“The downtown area was ripped apart,” recalls Martha Pearson, who works in the town's billing department. “It was absolutely amazing.”

That tornado killed four and injured 395.

Earlier, a tornado had roared across Interstate 77, flattening trees in a quarter-mile-wide path that motorists traveling between Charlotte and Columbia could see for years afterward.

Meteorologists say the tornado outbreak was the result of a familiar set of circumstances – a strong low-pressure system, and strong winds blowing from different directions at various levels of the atmosphere, creating a twisting motion.

Pagano says many newcomers to the Carolinas think of killer tornadoes as a Midwest phenomenon.

“But they can happen here – and they have,” she says.

*****

I remember that night well. And today's forecast (March 28th) is:

Heavy rain, thunderstorms and damaging winds are expected to move into the Charlotte area this afternoon.

A low-pressure system is forecast to bring widespread areas of moderate to heavy rain with thunderstorms this afternoon and tonight, according to the National Weather Service.

Some storms could produce damaging winds, hail and isolated tornadoes. Storms east of Interstate 85 may produce more than 3 inches of rain with possible flash flooding.

Once the rain gets here it will last through the rest of the day.

The heavier rain and the chance for severe weather will move into the Charlotte area around 4 p.m.

The highest risk for severe weather will be from Georgia through South Carolina and then into the eastern part of North Carolina mainly this afternoon.

Charlotte's on northern edge, our highest risk is going to be for gusty winds in some of these thunderstorms. Combine those gusty winds with all of the wet weather that we've had - the ground is saturated so we could see some trees knocked down.”

The forecast is better for Sunday. It's expected to be cloudy through mid-morning with gradual clearing and a high of 65.