NOTE: This content is about weather and meteorology, similar to that contained in my WeatherMatrix Blog which ran from 2005-2022 on AccuWeather.com.
This statement was issued in real-time on Twitter, where it got 1,000 retweets, Facebook, Blue Sky, and Mastadon. It was later uploaded here for posterity.
A STATEMENT ON THE SITUATION IN WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA & SOUTHERN APPALACHIANS
SEPT. 28, 2024
I finally had to log off from covering Hurricane Helene and get some sleep last night, but I didn’t stop thinking about the damage in western North Carolina, where I grew up. I believe that Helene has created a unique logistics and infrastructure nightmare there which will last weeks and it will take months to recover.
The Mountains have Turned into “Islands:”
Western North Carolina, WNC for short, (and also bordering portions of NW SC & eastern TN) is effectively a series of tiny islands at this point, and I don’t mean because of the flooding, but from a disaster perspective. After a major hurricane at the coast, relief and utility services can gradually work their way to the coast as roads open, but the barrier islands are cut off for days or weeks. The same will be true for parts of WNC. NCDOT says 400 roads are closed.
Every road/bridge that got washed out also took out water, gas and communications lines with it. This will take weeks to fix and will likely come with great human suffering the likes of which the area has never seen. Relief organizations won’t be able to get into the areas where help is most needed due to so many roads being washed out.
The best bet for the next week will be helicopters and satellite internet, if people have the hardware. Even flying people/supplies into small airports won’t be effective because so many roads are closed.
Communications Breakdown:
It took 24 hours for me to get back in contact with my Mom in Wilkes County. She lost power Thursday morning when Helene was more than 750 miles away. Reed also was unable to get in contact with his Mom as of last night. Here’s why.
Cell tower providers are only required federally to have 8 hours of backup. In hurricane-prone near-shore areas, they optionally have 24-72 hours backup in some cases. Diesel or Natural Gas generators can run indefinitely.
I bet that Cell towers in WNC don’t have that additional backup that they do in coastal areas. Diesel generators, the usual way of powering cell phone towers, cannot be reached by road now, as more than 400 roads are closed and I would guess many last-mile roads to cell towers are in wooded areas where many trees have fallen or even dirt roads that may have washed out.
I would guess the majority of cell phone towers are down now in WNC. At least 50%, maybe 75%. Natural gas generators, if they exist in WNC, may have had their lines cut by road washouts. Fiber lines have been cut. This could extend the communications outage for a week or longer, I would estimate. Maybe due to smaller population, it won’t be the worst Cell outage on record but by area, it could be.
My mom also had a Land Line, which not many people still do. A tree knocked that line down Friday morning and now she only has her cell phone, but no way to charge it. This is playing out for thousands of residents in WNC.
Residents In the Dark:
Almost every county in western NC & SC is 60-100% dark, still this morning. Higher winds than people expected, through trees that were full with big leaves and already unstable in wet ground from a wet summer, took down 4.9 million customers concurrently, the most since Hurricane Irma in 2017 according to the guy at PowerOutage.US. 3.6m are still without power this morning.
Western NC is mountainous and densely vegetated, making repairs tricky on a good day. Crews will not be able to get to many areas because roads have been washed out. Even as roads are repaired, many people have lines down on their property. At my Mom’s house in Wilkes County, the damage is reminiscent of Hurricane Hugo in 1989, even though the winds were less than Hugo in that area (likely because of the wet summer).
In 1989 during Hugo, we were without power for at least a week, phone for two weeks, and I think it will be that long for many residents once again.
Flooding Beyond Extreme:
The gauge records broken in WNC are incredible. In some cases the equipment has been washed away but at those gauges that survived, the numbers are staggering and many records have been set.
Most major floods we’ve covered in the last 10-20 years have had a gauge or two overtop their records by a few inches. The French Broad River at Fletcher, south of Asheville, broke its high water mark by 10.2 feet. The Swannanoa River at Biltmore, by more than 6 feet.
The News is NOT Getting out!
In general, the media sent their folks to Florida, and they are still there, covering that important story but leaving this important story on the back burner, and it’s a story that’s just beginning.
News is not getting out now in the way it normally would because so many people are without power or cell service. Entire towns and communities have been destroyed, and they are also isolated from a travel and infrastructure perspective. The death toll is likely to rise, perhaps greatly in WNC.
— Jesse Ferrell, Former WNC Resident
— AccuWeather Meteorologist & Digital Content Producer
— These opinions may not reflect those of AccuWeather