Gaston County battered by storms, more rain to come

Gaston County was battered by storms over the weekend leading to flood water accumulating on major roads and trees down in several municipalities.

Gastonia's Assistant Fire Chief Matthew Young said teams responded to six calls for water rescues over the weekend.

Many of those calls came from drivers on Franklin boulevard, but other hotspots included Caldwell Street and North Firestone Street, he said.

Some calls for water rescue came from residents in their homes.

According to the National Weather Service, those storms are likely to continue and impact the same areas through Thursday.

“We’re still in the same pattern basically that led to the formation of heavy rain around the region over the weekend,” said NWS Meteorologist Jake Wimberley.

He said a plume of moisture extending from the Gulf of Mexico to the Atlantic that is causing heavy rain is not moving due to a lack of motion in the sky.

“It’s been a sort of pattern where we have more thunderstorms pop up than usual, and the way that there’s not been very much motion in the atmosphere to make them move very much, they’ve been tending to sit over a small area for their whole lifetime,” Wimberley said. “That general pattern is going to continue through at least Thursday, it looks like.”

Areas that have already been experiencing excess rainfall will be at a higher risk for flooding and continued thunderstorms, he added.

A NWS rain gauge in eastern Gastonia near Cramerton recorded more than six inches of rain between July 19-22, according to Wimberley.

This article originally appeared on The Gaston Gazette: Gaston County battered by storms, more rain to come