Hurricane Helene and its remnants slammed Asheville, North Carolina, and its mountainous county particularly hard over the past couple days in what one local official described as “biblical devastation.”
The storm, which became a powerful Category 4 hurricane before making landfall late on Thursday, swept through the southeastern United States into the weekend, and dozens of deaths across Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas, and Virginia have been attributed to it.
Visceral images of submerged buildings have emerged out of Buncombe County, and in particular Asheville, where the National Weather Service said “devastating flooding” had taken place. On Sunday, local authorities said up to 30 people were dead in the county because of the storm.
Devastating flooding in the Asheville area from Helene. https://t.co/lKFM5PQPps
— NWS GSP (@NWSGSP) September 28, 2024
“We are grieving tremendous losses today,” Buncombe County Sheriff Quentin Miller reportedly said during a Sunday evening news conference, adding that search and potential rescue operations were still underway.
Asheville, a city of roughly 95,000 residents located in the Blue Ridge Mountains region, received 14 inches of rain over three days. Some other areas got as much as 30 inches, or four months’ worth of rainfall, according to Fox Weather.
“North Carolina is strong and our first responders are the best in the nation. I am thankful for their hard work and for risking their lives to protect all North Carolinians. This is an unprecedented tragedy that requires an unprecedented response,” said North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat.
The Asheville Citizen Times noted the storm caused power outages, dam and reservoir breaches, downed trees, and cell service disruptions, and created impassable roads and caused people to be stuck in their homes. Officials were also working to set up food and water distribution sites.
It’s a complete “catastrophe in Asheville, North Carolina.”
Biden is at the beach and Kamala is too busy with her San Francisco fundraisers to notice. pic.twitter.com/qqglYOuEkq
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) September 29, 2024
President Joe Biden has approved disaster relief for North Carolina, as well as Florida, Tennessee, and Virginia to make federal resources available to help with the recovery efforts in Buncombe and other counties, but he and Vice President Kamala Harris have been criticized for not doing more.
“It’s a complete ‘catastrophe in Asheville, North Carolina,’” said the RNC Research account on X in a post that also featured a clip of a news report on the destruction left by Helene. “Biden is at the beach and Kamala is too busy with her San Francisco fundraisers to notice.”
