Lenoir County Emergency Services continues to monitor Tropical Storm Debby and is actively preparing for potential impacts.

The 11 a.m. National Weather Service forecast still has Debby making landfall around 8 p.m. today
and progressing northward, entering Central North Carolina around 8 p.m. Thursday.

Lenoir County is currently experiencing scattered showers, which will continue throughout this afternoon and evening.

We expect to see an increase in rain shower intensity and duration late tonight and early tomorrow morning as the outer bands surrounding the storm’s eye move closer to Eastern N.C.

Latest forecasts show Lenoir County should expect to see an additional 6-8 inches of rain from this afternoon through Friday night. Although this amount is slightly less than earlier predictions, total storm accumulations for our area are still expected to be in the 10-12-inch range. The River Prediction Center currently forecasts the Neuse River in Kinston to peak at 15-16 feet next week, but this is dependent on final rainfall amounts experienced throughout central N.C. through this weekend.

Life-threatening flash flooding is still a strong possibility later tonight through mid-day Friday. Lenoir County remains at risk for gusty winds and tornadoes through Friday evening as well. Residents should continue anticipating and preparing for the possibility of broken tree limbs, downed trees, and sporadic power/communications outages as the center of Debby draws closer to North Carolina.

Anyone living in low-lying or flood-prone areas should make plans now in case evacuations are needed.

Road conditions also may deteriorate rapidly with the amount of rainfall we are expecting; therefore, we strongly encourage residents to consider restricting travel plans as the storm draws closer to Lenoir County later tonight and tomorrow morning. Never drive through flooded streets or roadways. It only takes 3-4 inches of moving water to sweep passenger cars off the road so remember, “turn-around and don’t drown.”

As always, we urge everyone to stay weather-aware over the next few days and ensure they have multiple ways to receive weather and emergency warnings including battery-powered radio, cell phones and NOAA Weather Radio.

Lenoir County will continue to share emergency information and storm updates on all our social media platforms.

Residents are also encouraged to sign up for Lenoir County’s Hyper-Reach mass notification system to receive real-time emergency notifications at http://hyper-reach.com/nclenoirsignup.html.