Helene top stories
Gerard Albert III
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Blue Ridge Public Radio
Initial impacts from Helene — which hit the Carolinas as a tropical storm — are over. Emergency workers toiled around the clock to clear roads, restore power and phone service, and reach people stranded by the storm, which killed at least 133 people across the Southeast, a toll expected to rise.
Submitted Image
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NC Gov. Office
Helene brought catastrophic damage to scores of roads in western North Carolina. This map, maintained by the N.C. Department of Transportation, tracks the current status of road closures.
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The N.C. General Assembly provided a total of $96 million for flood mitigation projects in 2021. So far, the state has spent just under half of that money. -
State and federal money has been slow to arrive, but Madison County locals have been able to get things up and running with donations and volunteer labor. Now they're hoping tourists will return for what could be a make-or-break 2026. -
North Carolina's hazard mapping program is trying to better predict which landslide-prone places face threats in future storms. The state's geological survey responded to more slides after Helene than it had between 1990 and 2023. -
Last year, Hurricane Helene devastated western North Carolina, which is where the popular native Fraser fir tree also used as a Christmas tree grows. The storm and inflation have been challenges for Christmas tree growers in the western part of the state.
