Death Storm Helene

[superjohn]

Hopefully, @ctchamps and even the PITA Florida State visitor @billybud fared better than far too many in Asheville and numerous other hard hit areas in and near the NC mountains.

Underreported to date nationally, but the confluence of 2 storms (1 stalled out dumping rain on prior saturated areas even before Helene arrived), and reportedly resulted in as much as 20-30” of rain in some areas. Roads (interstate, state and local), railroad tracks, homes, businesses, cellular towers, etc flooded and washed away, landslides, no power, water and sewage treatment in some instances, no internet, mobile service, etc out. UNC Asheville, App State, etc closed for at least a week and likely more, etc, and sadly many lives likely lost. National Guard in NC and from other states, including CT, are deployed/deploying to help with rescue, recovery, infrastructure, etc.

Here’s one Asheville station report regarding the combined storms effects in the area: Home

A friend's son lives on Black Mountain in Asheville. He's okay but he had to rescue a family. His Shope Creek neighborhood is apocalyptic.

 

[TrueBlue22]

I live in Cherokee, NC. Luckily me and my girlfriend were away in Connecticut during Helen and we are also lucky enough to have family back home that are safe, and able to look after our animals during the flooding.

We are however, currently stranded with no real way of getting into that part of western North Carolina. On top of that, I work over the mountain in Gatlinburg, TN. With all the roads closed, even if I get home, I will have no way of getting to work that doesn’t take about 3 hours. Obviously, prayers for those who weren’t lucky enough to be away from the area this week.

Right now the word coming from friends and family back in the mountains is that things are much worse than the news is reporting. No cell service in most places, so a lot of the footage is taking a long time to release. Also, with cell service down, no one is really sure who is missing at the moment in some of the more rural areas. Not to paint a grim picture, but just sharing some more info from someone who lives in the area.