'A War Zone:' Channel Rallies Around Helene Survivors as Hurricane Milton Looms

Local communities in the Southeast linking arms recover from one of the most destructive hurricanes in U.S. history, even as another massive hurricane encroaches on Florida.

Hurricane Helene struck the mainland U.S. last week and carved out a corridor of damage and death as it moved north. The death toll has surpassed 230 lives, with at least 117 coming from North Carolina and at least 48 in South Carolina. Other people remain stranded by flooding in remote, mountainous areas. Members of the channel community say they have witnessed mass property damage due to flooding.

"It's going to be very, very long recovery for a lot of these communities," said Adam Rushlow, a resident of Tennessee. "We've got several communities where the entire downtown, like Irwin and Newport, are completely underwater."

In the meantime, Category 5 tropical storm Hurricane Milton is hurtling through the Gulf of Mexico and will likely hit Florida Wednesday night. Officials have ordered mandatory evacuations for the areas bracing for impact, predicting the storm surge to rise twice as high as it did during Helene.

Helene's Damage

Urban and rural areas alike have suffered devastation from Helene. Trisha Coyle, a resident of Ridge Spring, South Carolina and a channel sales manager at SpectroTel, woke Sept. 27 to high winds and rains that left trees strewn around on the ground. Florida residents found their yards underwater.

Related:Hurricane Helene Hammers Telecom Infrastructure in the Southeast

Adam Rushlow

Water "completely enveloped" a two-story house in Eastern Tennessee, Rushlow said.

"If you go anywhere near the Nolichucky river [in Tennessee], you'll see water lines in the trees that are 20 feet up," said Rushlow, who has been working on cleanup efforts.

A clean-up team works on a house in Greene County, Tennessee (photo by Adam Rushlow)

Mekenzie LeClair, partner at Tech Advisor Services, has been working with a team in towns outside of hard-hit Asheville, North Carolina. Many residents are stranded in mountainous Appalachian area, either cut off from transportation or unwilling to leave.

One man LeClair met on Monday had gone up one of the mountains with a group of mules and taken back 100 survivors, she said.

Tech Advisor Services' Mekenzie LeClair

"He said there were still hundreds in the mountainside who are refusing to leave because they're scared they're going to lose their properties. You have a church that has almost 200 kids who cannot find their parents," she said. "So when you are boots on the ground and hearing those stories and seeing what looks like a complete war zone, this does not feel like America."

Government Response

FEMA and military officials have arrived in some of the areas to facilitate rescues and deliveries. LeClair saw a significant Army presence at the North Carolina sites.

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"It was actually quite frightening, because there were so many military personnel on the ground wearing huge guns," she said.

In Greeneville, Tennessee, the Army's 101st Airborne Division arrived Saturday night after pleadings after Tennessee emergency response agency and FEMA reportedly denied requests from Greene County officials.

FEMA stated Tuesday that it has offered $286 million to Helene survivors, but a staffing shortage at the agency may be hampering the scope of its response. LeClair said a drop-off point in the small town of Swannanoa saw its first FEMA delivery on Tuesday.

Community Responses

Various members of the channel living in the Southeast told Channel Futures they've seen their communities rally around the impacted populations.

"As a North Carolinian, it has been amazing to see the response from people across the state trying to help these people who are in a destitute situation," said Courtney Humphrey, CEO of Raleigh-based Opex Technologies. "So many families have been affected, whether their homes were washed off the map or destroyed. And reality up there is, less than 2% of the people have flood insurance. In a lot of ways, they're going to be at a total loss as it results from an insurance standpoint, which is how most people recover in these situations. So they're dependent on the community."

Opex made a donation to business incubator Raleigh Founded's efforts in providing assistance to Western North Carolinans and purchased chainsaws for the collection.

Courtney Humphrey and his kids dropped off chainsaws for Raleigh Founded's Hurricane relief efforts.

Purcellville, Virginia-based LAVA Technology Services missed the worst of the storm, but the firm is working with its local community to send resources down to Asheville. LAVA CEO Jake Jansen over the weekend learned of a friend who had gone down to Asheville with a group of friends from the Army Rangers to deliver supplies. LAVA turned its office into a hub for collections.

"We are by no means saviors or heroes to any of this. We are just creating a drop-off point in town, and then we're giving it to the people that are taking it down, and they have connections there," Jansen told Channel Futures. "We just figured we would use our network and our reach to try to help."

Jansen's business partner Billy Stowe hails from New Orleans, which Hurricane Katrina famously devastated two decades ago.

"As someone who knows first hand the impact that Hurricane Katrina had on my hometown New Orleans area, we want to help support our fellow Americans impacted by Hurricane Helene," Stowe said on Linkedin as he shared an Amazon wish list for relief efforts.

Trisha Coyle plans to make a trip with her sister's organization Refuge International, which goes to affected areas with an RV that contains two showers, a washer and a dryer.

LeClair said survivors, particularly those in Appalachia, need resources catered to their region. That includes bug spray to fend off yellow jackets that have sprung out of the ground in droves.

"Someone I was with yesterday got stung; they were everywhere," LeClair said.

In addition, charcoal and charcoal grills will be important, especially for people living in isolated mountain regions. She said a cold front is approaching, which necessitates hand and feet warmers.

LeClair pointed to Asheville Dream Center, Beloved Asheville and Samaritan's Purse as organizations getting involved with the recovery in Asheville.

Jacquelin Jenkins, a North Carolina resident and principal consultant at JNJ Advisory, lost a friend in a mudslide. She has posted on LinkedIn about fundraising efforts.

Milton Approaches

Meteorologists have spared no superlative for Hurricane Milton, which downgraded to a Category 4 on Monday before surging back to Category 5 status Tuesday.

Tampa's police chief called Milton "the storm of the century." Tampa's Mayor urged residents to leave the city. The storm sure will exceed 10 feet and flood single-story homes, she said.

"That’s the coffin that you’re in," ABC News quotes her saying at a news conference.