30 Dead in One County Alone in Rural North Carolina

The toll is expected to rise in Buncombe County, home to Asheville
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 30, 2024 6:07 AM CDT
Updated Sep 30, 2024 6:27 AM CDT
30 Dead in One County Alone in Rural North Carolina
A stop sign can be barely seen above a flooded parking lot after torrential rain from Hurricane Helene caused severe flooding Saturday in Morganton, N.C., in Burke County.   (AP Photo/Kathy Kmonicek)

The full scope of the damage wrought by Hurricane Helene on the southeastern US continues to emerge as floodwaters recede. Perhaps no locale has been hit harder than North Carolina's mountainous Buncombe County, where the death toll stands at 30 and is expected to rise, reports the Asheville Citizen Times. The county includes the city of Asheville on the Swannanoa River.

  • Hundreds remain missing in Buncombe, though communication issues and the chaos of rescues—neighbors taking in neighbors—are a factor.
  • "We have biblical devastation," says Ryan Cole, an emergency official in the county, per the BBC. "This is the most significant natural disaster that any one of us has ever seen."
  • Many residents were still struggling without water, food, power, and cellphone service, per the New York Times. In Swannanoa, also in Buncombe, helicopters have been dropping food at a church. And the wastewater treatment plant in nearby Weaverville was damaged by 8 feet of water.

  • The Washington Post talks to one couple in Asheville, Beverley and Baxter Eller, whose modest home was devastated Friday morning as Helene swept through. Their home had never flooded once previously in their four decades there. "It just came up so fast," says Baxter, 65. "In five minutes, the water had risen probably six feet." They and their dog barely escaped to a shelter south of the city. "The house on the corner from us just floated away," Beverly tells the newspaper.
  • The overall death toll in the states of North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee, and Virginia was 91 on Monday morning, per the AP. Most (55) were in the Carolinas.
(More Hurricane Helene stories.)

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