Hurricane Dorian Expected to Strike Very Close to Where Florence and Matthew Did in the Carolinas

Hurricane Dorian will be the third hurricane in four years to impact parts of the Carolinas and is certain to cause anxiety for people there because its track overlaps with the paths of Hurricane Matthew (2016) and Hurricane Florence (2018).

Those two hurricanes were responsible for $35 billion in damage and 102 deaths in the U.S., largely in the Carolinas.

Now, Dorian will track close to the coasts of South Carolina and North Carolina into late week.

Even if it doesn't make landfall, the storm will have significant impacts near the Carolina coasts. Dangerous storm surge, heavy rainfall and strong winds are all serious concerns.

(MORE: Dorian Forecast)

Matthew took a different path when it tracked through the Caribbean as a Category 5 hurricane and then moved through the Bahamas and northeastward up the Southeast coast. Matthew made landfall near McClellanville, South Carolina, on Oct. 8, 2016, as a Category 1 hurricane.

(MORE: Hurricane Matthew Recap)

Water levels topped 5 feet above normal at Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and water levels on the Cape Fear River at Wilmington shattered its previous record. Significant storm surge flooding also affected the Outer Banks of North Carolina.

Winds gusted to 70 mph in Wilmington, North Carolina, and up to 88 mph in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina.

Two years later, Hurricane Florence took a different track from Matthew and moved westward into the Carolinas in September 2018. Florence was a Category 4 hurricane as it tracked through parts of the Atlantic, but was a Category 1 storm when it made landfall at Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina on Sept. 14.

(MORE: Hurricane Florence Recap)

But catastrophic flooding, not wind, is what was most memorable about Florence.

A new state tropical cyclone rainfall record was set in North Carolina when 35.93 inches fell near Elizabethtown and in South Carolina where 23.63 inches fell in Loris.

This extreme rainfall resulted in record river flooding in some areas. Numerous other river gauges recorded major flood levels.

Storm surge also set record tide levels in a few spots, including in Wrightsville Beach, where levels reached 4.11 feet above high tide.

Strong winds also accompanied Florence and a wind gust of 106 mph was recorded at Cape Lookout and Wilmington, North Carolina, measured a gust of 105 mph.

Another storm people in the region may remember occurred twenty years ago: Hurricane Floyd.

Floyd tracked off the Southeast coast into North Carolina as a Category 2 hurricane and produced torrential rain on already saturated ground, which led to massive flooding. There were more than 50 deaths in the U.S. attributed to Floyd, most of them due to inland freshwater flooding.