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Death toll rises; Millions of dollars in power outages

Posted on by Vanessa
Death toll rises; Millions of dollars in power outages

Helene brought a cascade of destruction across the Southeast, from Florida to the Carolinas. The storm leveled houses and caused rivers to reach record levels.

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Dozens killed. Hospital visitors run to the rooftops to be transported away in helicopters. Mayors are desperately calling on citizens to flee. And prisoners desperately pushed out of a prison that was on the brink of flooding.

Helene has brought a cascade of destruction across the Southeast. The record-breaking storm hit Florida as a hurricane with winds of 140 miles per hour, leveling buildings. It has since weakened into a post-tropical cyclone with winds of 25 mph, but the deluge of rain it brings is leaving parts of North Carolina and Tennessee underwater and causing about 3.8 million power outages as of Saturday morning.

“It's destroyed,” Jordon Bowen of the Florida State Guard's Special Operations Unit told the Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Network, of the area where Helene landed. “Inaccessible, rubble, lots of dangers, broken power lines, houses cut in half.”

Meanwhile, staggering amounts of rainfall were recorded in the mountains of North Carolina, including 29.6 inches at Busick and 24.2 inches at Mount Mitchell, the highest peak east of the Mississippi and a landmark along the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Helene made landfall near Perry, Florida, around 11:10 p.m. ET on Thursday, becoming the first known Category 4 storm to hit the Big Bend region of Florida since records began in 1851. The storm continued its advance over western Kentucky on Saturday and is expected to do so. The National Hurricane Center said the hurricanes will move slowly southeast over the weekend and then east along the Kentucky-Tennessee border.

According to authorities and media reports across the southeast, at least 43 people had died under Helene's attacks as of Friday evening. Officials said they expect the death toll to continue to rise as they go door-to-door in the wake of the storm.

Friday: Stranded people rescued in hospital in East Tennessee

Helene's catastrophic winds and flooding caused $95 billion to $110 billion in damage and economic losses, making it one of the costliest storms in history, according to an initial estimate from AccuWeather.

The estimate includes damage to homes, businesses, roads, vehicles and the impact of power outages, as well as lost wages, flight delays, supply chain damage and more, AccuWeather said in a news release.

Other catastrophic storms include Hurricane Ian in 2022, which caused approximately $180 billion to $210 billion in damages; Hurricanes Harvey and Irma in 2017, with a total cost of about $270 billion; Hurricane Sandy in 2012 at $210 billion; and Hurricane Katrina in 2005, with damages of around $320 billion. AccuWeather's estimates have been adjusted for inflation.

A combination of weather patterns across the eastern United States triggered historic flooding on Tennessee's Nolichucky River on Friday, forcing people from their homes in the middle of the night as officials warned of dam bursts and raging torrents that devastated communities.

In several forecast calls earlier in the week, meteorologists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration described a band of moisture off Helene. These are called precursor events and have been documented in the past to cause heavy rainfall before tropical storms and hurricanes arrive.

Nearly 10 inches of rain fell in Asheville and 8 inches in Tryon along North Carolina's Blue Ridge Mountains on Wednesday and Thursday, according to preliminary weather service data. Another six inches fell over the two days in Bristol-Johnson, Tennessee, and more than ten inches in Knoxville.

Helene's massive orbit then mixed with more rain and then transformed into a post-tropical cyclone. Recent studies have shown that some hurricanes are sucking up more moisture from the warming Gulf of Mexico, further increasing rainfall.

Record-breaking rainfall amounts were reported in some locations across the Southeast Friday evening, with more than a foot of rain falling across much of Georgia and South Carolina. Amounts of 4 to 7 inches were common in Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia.

Rain flowing into rivers in the mountainous regions quickly led to catastrophic flooding, setting an all-time record on the Pigeon River in Newport, Tennessee. In Asheville, record highs were recorded on the French Broad River and the Swannanoa River near the Biltmore estate.

At least three of the flood records broken Friday were set more than a century ago, when the remaining remnants of a tropical system in July 1916 were followed by another that dumped heavy rain.

‒ Dinah Voyles Powder, USA TODAY

Deaths have been reported in the storm's path from dangerous weather conditions unleashed by Helene, and authorities expect the death toll to continue to rise. At least 43 deaths have been reported so far.

In Florida, at least seven deaths have been attributed to the storm. In Pinellas County, which includes Clearwater and St. Petersburg, five people died from the storm, emergency management director Cathie Perkins said at a news conference Friday. Early Friday morning, Gov. Ron DeSantis told reporters that one person died after a tree fell on a home in Dixie County on the Big Bend coast. One person was killed in a storm-related traffic accident in Tampa's Ybor City on Thursday evening, the governor said.

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp's office said at least 15 people were killed in the storm, including a first responder. “One of our finest lost his life trying to save others,” Kemp said at a news conference.

At least 19 people died in the storm across South Carolina, the Charleston-based Post and Courier newspaper reported, citing local officials. Of those, two people were killed by trees that fell on their homes, the Anderson County Sheriff's Office and coroner's office told local media. Two firefighters in Saluda County were also killed, Gov. Henry McMaster said at a news conference. Two people died in Newberry County, Sheriff James Lee Foster said in an email. Four others died in Aiken County, Coroner Darryl Ables told USA TODAY by phone.

In North Carolina, a four-year-old was killed and others injured Thursday in an accident as Helene's outside gangs attacked the state. In Charlotte, North Carolina, one person died and another was hospitalized after a tree fell on a home just after 5 a.m. Friday, according to the Charlotte Fire Department.

Helene first hit Florida's Big Bend and crashed into it with sustained winds of 140 miles per hour. The small area along the state's Gulf Coast near Tallahassee has seen many severe storms over the years, but none as strong as Helene.

“It's complete devastation,” Scott Peters, the owner of a Florida bar leveled by the storm, told USA TODAY. “I have to start from scratch.”

Peters, the owner of Crabbie Dad's Bar, is among those whose property was leveled by the storm in Steinhatchee, a small town just dozens of miles from where Helene made landfall.

The city suffered a record-breaking storm surge of 9.63 feet, leaving dry land in 40 to 50 inches of water, according to Bowen of the state guard.

John Kujawski, another local, told USA TODAY the storm reopened the wounds of Hurricane Idalia, which hit the city in August 2023. Roofs that had been repaired were again destroyed, docks were thrown ashore and boats overturned and became lodged in the marina's pilings.

The storm destroyed dozens of homes in Horseshoe Beach, another coastal town south of Steinhatchee. Some of the houses were torn from their concrete foundations, while others had their roofs blown away by the wind.

Helene demolished the stairs to Bill and Debbie Dotson's house, leaving the couple living in a tent on the ground below. The house, like many others in the area, is built on concrete foundations to protect it from flooding.

The Dotsons said they believe Helene caused more damage to the area than Idalia, which destroyed about 40 homes. The 2023 storm also destroyed one of their staircases and damaged another, a $15,000 repair job that a local contractor had just recently completed.

Helene is the couple's fourth hurricane since moving to the area in 2021

“We had the discussion about hurricanes, but you can never imagine something like that. You just don’t do that,” said Debbie Dotson, 63. “We’re definitely grateful it’s standing.”

Helene's winds died down as the storm headed toward Tennessee and North Carolina, but it dumped so much water that it nearly swallowed a hospital, caused rivers to rise to record highs and prompted local officials to urge citizens to warn of possible floods dam bursts to flee to higher areas.

Officials from Florida to northern Virginia urged people to move to higher ground.

The Nolichucky River near the North Carolina border nearly washed away Unicoi County Hospital in Erwin, Tennessee. Rising waters forced 54 hospital staff and patients to move to the roof to be boarded by helicopters and boats.

“The hospital was engulfed by extremely dangerous and fast-moving water,” Ballad Health wrote in a call for help

The Pigeon River flowing through Newport broke record heights, reaching 27 feet. The nearby French Broad River is also expected to reach near record levels by Saturday morning.

Rising water levels in downtown Newport prompted officials to evacuate the prison on the banks of the Pigeon. About 60 inmates were transferred from the Cocke County Jail to the Jefferson County Jail, a Jefferson County official said.

Contributors: Trevor Hughes, Christopher Cann and Dinah Voyles Pulver, USA TODAY; Reuters

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