The rate of recovery and flow of information across Western North Carolina remains uneven nearly a week after Tropical Storm Helene veered to the east of its predicted track and dropped massive amounts of rain across North Carolina mountains and valleys that were already experiencing flooding from earlier rainfall.
In many places the path to stability and normal life now looks very long.
Much of the region lost power, cell towers, internet service, road access and running water. Those have been slow to return in many places and water in particular may take a long time, especially in the area’s largest city, Asheville, located in Buncombe County where the number of fatalities has been staggering.
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While death totals remain uncertain across much of the region, Buncombe County Sheriff Quentin Miller said Wednesday evening that the county has now confirmed 61 deaths, adding four to the total over the course of the day.
Search and rescue efforts are still underway in the parts of the county that are hardest to reach, Miller said. According to an Associated Press report, teams with cadaver dogs are being brought in to search some of the hardest hit communities, including Swannanoa, Black Mountain and Montreat in eastern Buncombe County.
As communications have improved, first glimpses at the challenges facing some remote areas for recovery across Western North Carolina have become possible, and the situation is often difficult. Other counties, some of which took a less direct hit, seem to be fairing better.
The storm had different types of effects in different areas. In Buncombe County, it was a wind, flash-flooding and river flooding event combined. In some others Helene was sometimes just one or two of those and less severe or with the worst problems missing major population centers.
Several counties have not released much information to the outside world and remain difficult to contact, due in part to the nature of damage in severing roads and communication infrastructure.
This report is a roundup of the latest news on recovery efforts from across the 25-county disaster region. It includes a county-by-county breakdown of recent information, where it is available.
Previous Carolina Public Press reports have included an in-depth look at school closings, college campuses, and planning for elections, which are not addressed in this article unless there has been an update.
CPP has also provided looks at images of Asheville and nearby areas during the worst flooding and as the water receded, in addition to conversations with people who are enduring despite the conditions.
Military and FEMA aid in recovery
Gov. Roy Cooper’s office announced Wednesday that President Joe Biden approved the mobilization of up to 1,000 active-duty military personnel to support the delivery of food, water and other critical aid to affected areas.
Those soldiers will be coming from units stationed at Fort Liberty near Fayetteville, and many will join the more than 1,000 North Carolina National Guard troops already deployed in Western North Carolina.
Biden traveled to North Carolina earlier Wednesday to survey the damage caused by Helene and the recovery efforts underway.
Earlier this week he directed FEMA administrator Deanne Criswell to remain in Asheville until the situation on the ground stabilizes.
The 25 North Carolina counties most affected by the storm have been approved for FEMA assistance. Those include Alexander, Allegheny, Ashe, Avery, Burke, Buncombe, Caldwell, Catawba, Clay, Cleveland, Gaston, Haywood, Henderson, Jackson, Lincoln, Macon, Madison, McDowell, Mitchell, Polk, Rutherford, Transylvania, Watauga, Wilkes and Yancey counties.
Ironically, because the storm’s center veered so much further to the east than the National Hurricane Center had predicted, three counties on the Tennessee line that were expected to get the worse of it in North Carolina, Cherokee, Graham and Swain, faced relatively minor issues and were not included in the disaster declaration.
Water woes
The city of Asheville provides water to its population of about 95,000, but also to many other water customers in rural areas and surrounding towns, in Buncombe and other nearby areas.
Control of that water has been a bone of contention through the years, leading to an attempted legislative takeover of Asheville’s water system that the courts halted in 2016.
Following Helene, that system is badly damaged and inoperable, with repairs expected a prolonged time. The situation is affecting hospitals, schools, businesses and residents, and is hampering other recovery efforts.
Asheville Assistant City Manager Ben Woody gave an update on the status of the city’s water system at a press briefing Wednesday.
One of the city’s water treatment plant’s is actually in the northern Henderson County town of Mills River. That plant, which provides water for the southern parts of Asheville and Buncombe County, is beginning to ramp up production after the storm.
However, the water coming from that plant is still non-potable, and residents receiving water from the system are still under a boil water advisory.
Meanwhile, Asheville’s North Fork water treatment plant, located in the eastern Buncombe County town of Black Mountain, is the principal facility that provides water to most Buncombe County customers under normal conditions.
But extensive repairs are needed to get the North Fork plant back up and running, Woody said. This is happening slowly as transmission lines and access roads are repaired. The turbidity levels at the North Fork reservoir must stabilize before water can start to be treated again at that plant, he said.
“Even if the plants are operational, we can’t get water to the community unless the distribution system is operational,” he said.
Crews from Greensboro, Raleigh, Charlotte and the Cape Fear area have been pulled in to work on repairs to the treatment plants and the city’s water distribution system, which Woody emphasized is heavily damaged.
“And just to highlight this, it’s not as simple as just replacing a water line,” he said. “Oftentimes, the entire road beds have washed out, so in order to even begin replacing the water lines we have to rebuild those road beds in a way that they can support the installation of these water lines. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”
Woody said he can’t even begin to give a ballpark estimate of when the running water might be returned to area residents who have been living without it for days now. Some residents in southern areas still have running water, but Woody couldn’t provide an estimate of just how many homes do not.
County by county recovery
Alexander County
Alexander County posted to the county government Website on Sunday that some 3,500 homes were “without power, but electric crews have made significant progress” toward recovery.
The county reported seven roads still closed at that time, including a portion of NC 16, but has not posted an update since then.
The county said Spectrum cable and internet service had been restored and phones and internet were now working on most county offices. Cell services was also returning to normal.
While conditions were less serious in Alexander than many other counties, law enforcement officers have been contributing to the broader effort.
A social media post from the Alexander County Sheriff’s Office on Tuesday said, “The Alexander County Sheriff’s Office, in collaboration with the NC SBI and Taylorsville Police Department, has sent several deputies to Mitchell County this morning to assist with search and rescue efforts.
“In support of western NC, we are also housing inmates from Yancey County.”
Alleghany County
The Alleghany County Sheriff’s department has been involved in at least one swift water rescue on Piney Creek on Monday and has been conducting many safety checks around the county.
Multiple roads in Alleghany County remained closed due to Tropical Storm Helene as of 3 p.m. Wednesday, according to the Alleghany Sheriff’s Office.
Those closures included NC 93 in Piney Creek, Weaver Road in Piney Creek, Millers Camp Road in Laurel Springs, NC 18 South in Laurel Springs, Caudill Road in Ennice, Crab Creek Road in Ennice, Shiloh Church Road in Sparta, Fender Mountain Road in Sparta, Old River Lane in Sparta, Elk Creek Church Road in Sparta, River Road in Sparta and Antioch Church Road in Sparta.
Alleghany County closed government offices on Friday during the storm, but has since reopened them.
The county announced on Tuesday that its transfer station on 431 Osborne Road had returned to normal hours of operation, 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., but the location’s phone remain down.
Avery County
Avery County officials have released limited information to news media, but law enforcement in Avery have told other county sheriff’s offices that they are facing the same challenges as many other small mountain counties pursuing recovery.
“(Avery County officers) are monitoring food distribution centers, answering patrol calls, searching for bodies, unloading helicopters, delivering supplies by ATVs to the back country and many more tasks,” according to a post from the Rowan County Sheriff’s Office.
Among the news items that has come out of Avery County, a bridge crossing Elk Creek has apparently collapsed.
At noon Wednesday, Avery County called on all county employees who are able to report to the county’s Agricultural Center — where an emergency shelter is set up — to do so. Other than that, they are asking everyone to stay off the roads as much as possible.
Buncombe County
Trash pickup will resume Thursday on routes that are deemed safe for large trucks, Buncombe County Manager Avril Pender said in a press briefing Wednesday.
The Buncombe County landfill is operating its regular hours, and residents can bring their trash there as well. The county transfer station was not open as of Wednesday.
Waste Pro, which is the trash collection services company that serves Buncombe, will have garbage trucks at three Ingles grocery store locations Thursday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. for residents to drop off bagged household trash.
Those locations are at 2901 Hendersonville Road near Fletcher, 1865 Hendersonville Road in Asheville and 225 Charlotte Highway in Asheville.
Pender asked residents to not put storm debris in their trash, as a separate debris hauler will be coming to collect that waste at a later date.
Haywood County
Haywood County, which borders Buncombe to the west and is home to more than 60,000 people, has had extremely limited access to phone and internet since Friday, which is adversely affecting recovery efforts.
Public information officer Dillon Huffman said Wednesday that the county government is “still not fully up and running.”
The county confirmed four deaths related to the storm, and said 165 rescues have been made with more still to be done, Huffman said.
Huffman also told CPP that the county has completed 570 welfare checks. In each case, residents at the address were OK. As of Wednesday, 119 welfare checks were still to be completed.
Most of the fiber internet network in Haywood County has been restored, though the county has issued numerous Facebook posts telling residents not to cut fiber cables.
A curfew remains in effect in Haywood County from 9 p.m. to 7 a.m.
All government offices in Haywood County remain closed.
Waynesville, the county seat of Haywood County, lifted its boil water advisory on Sunday. While trash service in Waynesville remains suspended, all dumps are open.
The town of Canton, which was the site of horrendous flooding during Tropical Storm Fred in 2021, attempted a complete evacuation on Friday. Now, both Canton and the nearby town of Clyde are under mandatory water conservation notices, with high-volume water users subject to fines.
Multiple utility poles are down across Haywood County, specifically in Canton and the Cruso area, which are both along the flood-prone Pigeon River. Flooding from Fred in Cruso and Canton led to six fatalities.
While the death toll this time remains uncertain, the devastation that is obvious tells a clear story, according to Huffman.
“Helene is worse than Fred,” he told CPP.
Henderson County
Pardee Hospital is operating a medical shelter at Hendersonville High School to support those in the community with medical devices that need to be serviced.
However, Pardee is not refilling oxygen tanks. The Mills River Fire Department and the Mountain Home Fire Department are assisting those who need oxygen refills.
As the county works on recovery efforts, resource hubs around Henderson County will be providing hot to-go meals twice a day at noon and 5 p.m. at four locations while supplies last.
- Etowah Elementary, 320 Etowah School Road, Etowah
- East Henderson High, 150 Eagle Pride Dr, East Flat Rock
- North Henderson High, 35 Fruitland Rd, Hendersonville
- Mills River Town Hall, 124 Town Center Drive, Mills River
The Salvation Army is also serving breakfast at 9 a.m. and dinner at 4 p.m. while supplies last at its location at 239 Third Avenue East in Hendersonville.
Jackson County
The Sylva Herald shared a report Wednesday from Jackson County Emergency Management that no emergency shelters remain active in the county. However, the agency told the Herald that it remained “committed to assisting those in need and connecting them with solutions and support services” as recovery efforts continue.
Emergency Management in Jackson County asked residents who know of anyone still needing assistance to call them at 828-631-4357.
Jackson County is also home to Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, whose classes remain canceled through at least Friday.
Madison County
Madison County has put out little to no public communication about their condition following the storm or steps toward recovery.
Images that have appeared on social media suggest that the county seat in Marshall, which straddled the French Broad River, was badly damaged by flooding during Tropical Storm Helene.
In nearby Mars Hill, Mars Hill University announced Monday that it would remain suspended through the end of the week due to intermittent power outages.
McDowell County
As of Tuesday, McDowell County rescue teams had rescued 245 citizens. Helicopter teams rappelled rescue specialists into areas inaccessible by car or foot, and saved 100 more than people countywide.
An assisted living facility, which had 29 residents, was successfully evacuated after a collapsed bridge blocked access to the facility.
Water services in Marion never shut down or interrupted. Boil water notices have been lifted, though water conservation orders are still in effect. In one sign of recovery, most residents have electricity, according to Marion Mayor Steve Little.
Mitchell County
Search and rescue operations are ongoing in Mitchell County, with assistance coming from law enforcement in other counties, including as far away as Alexander County.
“Roads are not roads anymore, houses have trees on them or are no longer there,” reads a Facebook post from Mitchell County 911 Communications.
“Rescues are happening and pathways are being made, it’s not easy but it’s happening. People hunting family, there is virtually no phone service and definitely no power so we possibly cannot notify you when we check on them. We are doing our best. Volunteer fire and law enforcement are taking on roles that are exhausting and they are rocking it. We are going to touch every house, it’s just going to take a while.”
Blue Ridge Hospital, operated by Asheville-based Mission Health, has closed all outpatient clinics and services until at least Friday.
There are reports that some 300 retirees are stuck in a community in Little Switzerland and there is damage to an eminent computer chip factory in Spruce Pine.
Polk County
“We want to inform everyone that emergency responders are beginning to access areas that were previously impassable,” a Polk County statement from Tuesday reads.
“Our teams are diligently working to make face-to-face contact with residents in the hardest-hit regions, particularly in the western part of the county, where communication has been limited.”
The Polk County landfill is open, and the $10 service fee for residential trash service is waived through Oct. 8.
Rutherford County
The town of Lake Lure experienced historic, devastating floods. Lake Lure Fire Department and Emergency Management teams have help from the National Guard, US Coast Guard, NC and SC Helicopter Aquatic Rescue, the Army Corps of Engineers, and FEMA.
Door-to-door and aerial search and rescue missions are underway in parts of the county.
While officials say they appreciate private entities reaching out to help, the emphasize that the situation is being handled effectively by the local, state and federal governments.
“The whole downtown and Lake Lure area is completely decimated, with many buildings damaged or destroyed, with some completely wiped away,” reads a North Carolina Weather Authority statement.
“It’ll be a long road to recovery for these areas and they will need all the help they can get.”
Only official emergency personnel are authorized to enter Lake Lure. Due to the amount of debris and fuel on the lake, town officials are prohibiting anyone from going out on the lake.
A Lake Lure resource center with food, showers, restrooms, a tool trailer, charging stations, and Wi-Fi is operating at Ingles on Highway 9. A curfew remains in effect from 7:30 p.m. to 7:30 a.m. across the county, though cell service has improved. A boil water advisory is still in effect.
On Friday, town officials said failure of the Lake Lure Dam was “imminent,” causing widespread panic. On Tuesday, dam engineers issued the following statement:
“The dam generally performed as intended and is stable. Most of the arches overtopped, which they were designed to do during extreme floods, and the Emergency Action Plan (EAP) was subsequently activated out of an abundance of caution. The abutments did not overtop, and the concrete structure was not compromised.
“Some damage to the abutments and downstream area occurred, and plans are underway to repair these areas. The lake is being operated at a lower level until the repairs can be made, but there are no ongoing concerns associated with dam failure.”
In addition to the Town of Lake Lure, the nearby communities of Bat Cave and Chimney Rock appear to have been razed by rampaging flood waters in the Broad River. These areas are in the higher mountainous section of Rutherford County. Reports from the eastern area, which is in the state’s Piedmont region indicate less serious problems.
Watauga County
Two fatalities have been confirmed in Watauga County as a result of landslides caused by Hurricane Helene.
“This storm exceeded all forecasts,” Watauga County emergency services director Will Holt said in a Tuesday press briefing on the county’s recovery steps. “Conditions combined to bring the worst natural disaster in modern history to our county.
“Mountains simply gave way under the weight of wind and rain. Mother nature took back her mountains, leaving scars where roads and homes once stood.
“We deeply grieve the loss of life and livelihood, not just in Watauga County, but throughout the High Country as our neighbors in Ashe and Avery County, southwest Virginia and eastern Tennessee come to grips with what is now our new normal for the foreseeable future.”
In Watauga County, 911 took more than 2,000 calls in the first day of storm conditions. An average month of 911 calls is 3,000 calls for the county.
Teams began travelling Wednesday on horseback to aid with recovery in parts of the county they have not been ablet to access so far.
Repairs to Tynecastle Highway/NC-184 outside Banner Elk were underway as of Wednesday morning.
Water service in Banner Elk will not be restored in the near future. Banner Elk authorities said no one should be traveling voluntarily in and out of town, though power has been restored to main roads.
The closure of classes at Appalachian State University in Boone has been extended through Oct. 14, the university announced Wednesday. No residence halls at App State are structurally compromised, but campus roads may be dangerous or impassable after Helene, according to the university’s website.
Crews are working to rope off dangerous areas of campus. Students are urged to conserve water. Residence halls, the central dining hall, campus markets, the student union, student health services and student recreation remain open.
This is a developing story and will be updated. CPP news staff members Jane Winik Sartwell, Lucas Thomae and Frank Taylor contributed to this report.
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