The Scars of Helene: Western NC, Part 1

I took the highways out of Blacksburg, but when I saw signs for the Blue Ridge Parkway outside of Fancy Gap, VA, I impulsively took the exit. 

After a quick stop for gas, Harriet was surging and stalling a bit (will be having the mechanics take a look at this when I bring her in for her next servicing), but that cleared up after about 5 miles on the Blue Ridge. As the Parkway had me in a Carolina state of mind, I popped on my Blue Ridge playlist, which is mostly Carolina/Appalachian folk. 

I missed the turnoff for an awesome scenic overlook, but figured there'd be plenty more.

There weren't. 

I got about 20 beautiful miles in Virginia before the Parkway was abruptly closed about a mile after crossing into North Carolina due to damage from Hurricane Helene. For the next three and a half hours, I followed detours on back roads mirroring the Blue Ridge Parkway on the way down to Black Mountain, a small mountain town about 30 minutes outside of Asheville. 

While it was disappointing to not be able to take the Parkway the whole way down, the detours did provide an opportunity to stop at Taco Bell #4 in West Jefferson, NC. 

West Jefferson Taco Bell was a combined Taco Bell/KFC. I've got a soft spot for combined Taco Bell/KFCs as my childhood Taco Bell in Wexford, PA (where I tried my first Mexican Pizza and Popcorn Chicken) was also a combined Taco Bell/KFC. 

Atmosphere: The gigantic KFC container descending from the ceiling, open concept dining area, and fake wood-tone trays certainly gave this place a vibe. The decor leaned heavily towards the KFC side of things with multiple "vintage" collages of the Colonel traveling the world. The dining area wasn't sparkling, but was pretty clean on the whole. 

Staff: Ordering at a counter instead of a kiosk was a refreshing change, though it meant I didn't get any Taco Bell rewards points for this order :( . The girl working the counter was quite friendly and even gave me a free fountain drink. On the flip side though, I clearly remember ordering a Cantina Chicken Bowl but received a Cantina Chicken Burrito instead. They must have keyed it in wrong as they insisted I had ordered a burrito when I told them I thought I had ordered a bowl. 

Food: The Cantina Chicken Burrito was not on the same level that the Cantina Chicken Taco has been on at other stops, and was much more expensive to boot. I think this is more of a function of the taco being better than the burrito everywhere rather than a West Jefferson issue though. The Doritos Locos Taco I ordered came with some cracks already in the shell, which was a tad disappointing. 

Not the Blue Ridge Parkway

As I got further south, the damage from Helene became more and more apparent - gashes in the canopy where landslides cleared out swathes of foliage down entire mountain sides, rivers with washout scars triple their widths, temporary metal grate bridges installed next to the remains of the bridge that had been there before the storm, wiped out railroad embankments with twisted rebar falling off them, paved roads randomly transitioning to gravel for patches that had been washed out by the storm. 

Old Fort, NC. On the outskirts of town is where the damage wrought by Helene became most obvious (destroyed railroad embankments, washed out roads that still haven't been repaved). Old Fort is a scenic but struggling mountain town - only about 1 in every 5 storefronts is open, but they do boast a plethora of fantastic mountain biking trails. 

In western NC, I'm staying at a summer camp on the outskirts of Black Mountain with my friends Justin and Elizabeth. Justin was my brother's college roommate and Liz played college soccer with my sister, but I've since co-opted both of them and weaseled my way into the annual ski trip they arrange. Justin is a Program Director for a summer camp and Liz is a neuro-ICU nurse who recently started coursework to become a nurse practitioner. 

Apparently there are a lot of Doughertys in western NC. This was a cross street in the center of Black Mountain. I saw multiple other Dougherty references up north in Boone where the half marathon was. Perhaps I have long lost family down here. 

Camp has all cool lake stuff (inflatables, slides, ziplines).

Another shot of the lake and mountains cause its just too dang pretty to pass without taking a moment to appreciate it. 

Inspiration Point. A great place to think, meditate, or pray at camp. 

A clearing in the trees on the way down the mountain from Justin & Liz's cabin

Barely Falls - A scenic spot on one of the camp trails I hiked yesterday.

A landslide I encountered while hiking a camp trail yesterday - this is a relatively small one. 

It's impossible to talk about life in Black Mountain these days without talking about Helene. 

Justin was at camp when Hurricane Helene hit last summer (Liz was in Spain, hiking the Camino, but was back in time to see much of the aftermath). They didn't have electricity or water until a month after the storm (and the water wasn't safe to drink until about 4-5 months after the storm - they used backpacking water filters to drink creek water until indoor plumbing was restored). Only one building at camp was damaged by landslides, but one of their neighbor's houses was carried away by the flooded river and most houses in the neighboring town of Swannanoa were wiped out as the river swelled. 

It was mayhem in the immediate aftermath; with cell towers down and no electricity, very little communication was possible, even when FEMA and first responders from other parts of the country arrived. Justin spent the first week as a volunteer first responder. He told me about heading to a neighborhood in a valley that had been buried in an overnight mudslide with a shovel to try and dig to see if there were any survivors. At the far end of the neighborhood, he ran into some firefighters from Alabama who had been flown in overnight and had no idea where they were and had no way to communicate with other first responder teams due to the lack of cell service. 

As word of town meetings spread, things got a bit more organized though, and Justin transitioned to a zoning team working to visit each address in the area to check if residents needed assistance. Two stories from this phase really stood out to me: 

The first underscored just how difficult communication and coordinated efforts became. Justin was working as part of a team of four. They had left the planning meeting a few minutes early and were half a mile down the road when they realized their fourth man was not following behind in his truck. As they had no means of contacting him, they turned around and went back to the site of the meeting to look for him. Not finding him there, they left a sticky note on a whiteboard for him with their plans for the day and headed back to their assigned site, hoping to find him there. They did not see him for the rest of the day. For a month plus, notes like this were the only means of communication.

The next showed just how deep the community roots run in Black Mountain. Justin and a friend were doing rounds bringing critical supplies and checking in on the needs of elderly members of the community who others had asked them to check in on. One of the old men they checked in on who lived on the outskirts of town was moved to tears when they arrived. He told them he had no one - his sons no longer lived in the area and he lived an isolated life with no friends or connections to speak of. He was trapped in his house and figured he'd just remain trapped due to his isolation. He couldn't imagine who would have possibly told them he was stuck in the mountains and needed help. But someone in the Black Mountain community thought of him and did.  

While the carnage and destruction wrought by Helene was astronomical, Justin said there were many beautiful moments like the one above. He had expected that people would take an individualistic approach when society broke down, but found that the opposite occurred. The town rallied together and supported each other. People who had lost their houses gave the shirts off their back to others who were suffering. People brought their food trucks from all over country and kept serving free meals until they ran out of food. A latent sense of community, solidary, and love rose to the surface with the flood waters. 

Almost a year out, life has returned to "normal" in many, but not all ways. Justin says that the sense of community that formed in the aftermath of the storm still remains. Everyone's life down here was dramatically altered by Helene, so he thinks the communal solidarity will continue to remain.

The most critical roads and bridges have been replaced, but many physical reminders of the damage still remain. While the infrastructure will be repaired in time, the scars on the landscape, the washed out river beds and landslide sites, will last a lifetime or longer. 

And while many of these visible signs of the storm may be invisible to a visitor like me, they will remain conspicuous to locals who know the land intimately. The other day, Justin showed me the white water kayak he had planned to race in the the Green Race (a whitewater kayak race through a particularly difficult section of the Green River - one of the biggest events in American kayaking). Justin didn't get the chance to run the Green Race in that kayak and never will. The Green River was so dramatically altered by the flood waters of Helene so as to render it unrecognizable. The river as it was no longer exists and never will again. Many of the people down here who lost so much feel the same way about their lives. 

I've been in western NC for over a week now (more on my updated timeline in a future post), which has afforded me a lot of time to think and reflect. As I see the scars of Helene on the landscape, a few questions seem to keep working their way to the forefront of my mind. What scars have the storms of life left on my heart? What trials have forever altered the course of my life? 

If you're interested in donating to ongoing relief efforts, here's a link to a GoFundMe that Justin started for his neighbors whose house was carried away by the river. 

- Kevin