Hurricane Category 4 Hurricane Helene

[TH2002]

An unbelievable amount of debris in Lake Lure, NC. Trees, houses, piers and boats.

Just unreal destruction there... honestly, if I told someone that damage was from the 2011 Japan tsunami, it would seem believable. Helene is undoubtedly mounting to be the worst humanitarian crisis this country has faced since Katrina.

 

[Clancy]

Just unreal destruction there... honestly, if I told someone that damage was from the 2011 Japan tsunami, it would seem believable. Helene is undoubtedly mounting to be the worst humanitarian crisis this country has faced since Katrina.

Have seen several people refer to it as the Appalachian Katrina, and at this point I think that's fair.

 

[lake.effect]

"Appalachia's Katrina" came to my mind as well. Just the scope of the devastation + the humanitarian aspect of people being cutoff from basic services for days or weeks brings back those memories. Nothing comes as close since 2004.

Despite the catastrophic damage to buildings and towns, I'm most awestruck at the way this storm permanently changed the geography of certain parts of Western NC.

I've seen several videos that show newly-formed river gorges that are 20, 30, 50 feet deep, some even higher. Using Google Street View, you can see that the prior to the flooding these were mostly gently sloping river beds or at most, 5-10 foot drops. Now they look like actual canyons. This storm did the work of about 100,000 years of geology in a few days.

 

[akt1985]

Another thing to consider is all that water from the mountains will end up in the Tennessee River. Hopefully places like north Alabama don’t experience major River flooding.

 

[bjdeming]

Found this on Facebook while looking for landslide info, posted about two hours ago. It might help anyone here who is familiar with the area:

Krystal Shuler Hernandez profile picture Krystal Shuler Hernandez►2024 HURRICANE & TROPICAL STORM UPDATES 2h More
Krystal Shuler Hernandez►2024 HURRICANE & TROPICAL STORM UPDATES
2024
HURRICANE & TROPICAL STORM
UPDATES
2024 HURRICANE & TROPICAL STORM UPDATES
2h
2h
Lots of info on roads in comments of original post. Some other notes I learned if you know the area: -NC 226 is mostly fine until a collapsed road and a massive landslide near the Parkway -NC 226A is the worst off and won't be open for at least a year -US 221 bridges are out north of Woodlawn -Google Maps and Waze don't list all closures -Cell service is pretty much non-existent west of Hickory -Most of Marion and half of Morganton lack power -I saw crews from Indiana, Pennsylvania, US Customs/Border Patrol and even Florida up there... but no National Guard (?!?!) -They need air support and to get the Parkway open; that will be a key artery for access. -The Little Switzerland Cafe is ok. Please support them when you can. Best BBQ in Western NC.

Lots of info on roads in comments of original post. Some other notes I learned if you know the area: -NC 226 is mostly fine until a collapsed road and a massive landslide near the Parkway -NC 226A is the worst off and won't be open for at least a year -US 221 bridges are out north of Woodlawn -Google Maps and Waze don't list all closures -Cell service is pretty much non-existent west of Hickory -Most of Marion and half of Morganton lack power -I saw crews from Indiana, Pennsylvania, US Customs/Border Patrol and even Florida up there... but no National Guard (?!?!) -They need air support and to get the Parkway open; that will be a key artery for access. -The Little Switzerland Cafe is ok. Please support them when you can. Best BBQ in Western NC.

By all news stories I've seen, the NC Guard is deployed; perhaps they're in the flood areas, freeing up SAR to work through the hills?

 

[bjdeming]

Here's the original post she mentions. It's a little hard to read but not nearly as tough as being there. I wish I could help everyone!

 

[Clancy]

Found this on Facebook while looking for landslide info, posted about two hours ago. It might help anyone here who is familiar with the area:



By all news stories I've seen, the NC Guard is deployed; perhaps they're in the flood areas, freeing up SAR to work through the hills?

It seems thus far that this is a scenario in which there are truly tremendous logistical obstacles. Many areas seem to only be reachable by helicopter or boat, and both of those methods of transportation have serious limitations (areal reach, fuel and maintenance, passenger capacity, etc.). Local, state and federal resources are geographically strained and even where there are ample resources, getting them to people in need is another matter.

 

[Clancy]

High mountains of the Carolinas saw some intense winds from Helene, despite her weakening rapidly upon approach to the Lower Apps. Mount Mitchell saw a peak gust of 106 MPH.

 

[jiharris0220]

 

[Blountwolf]

Wow.

 

[Blountwolf]

TVA is working hard to control the releases to protect downstream areas from this flood. We don't think about it often, but our area's system of dams allows us to release the water from floods upstream carefully and over a longer period of time than would happen naturally, preventing a catastrophe in one region from becoming another downstream. Obviously there are limits, but it's a pretty amazing testament to our nation's infrastructure when you think about it.

 

[DUUUVAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLL]

Wow.

View attachment 30457

Record crushed

 

[JPWX]

Fatalities from Helene of 121 (as of today) is the first 100+ fatalities from a hurricane since Ian (2022). It's very unfortunate and the majority of these were from the widespread/catastrophic flash flooding well inland. I just hope we don't exceed 1K

 

[Blountwolf]

 

[Sawmaster]

It seems thus far that this is a scenario in which there are truly tremendous logistical obstacles. Many areas seem to only be reachable by helicopter or boat, and both of those methods of transportation have serious limitations (areal reach, fuel and maintenance, passenger capacity, etc.). Local, state and federal resources are geographically strained and even where there are ample resources, getting them to people in need is another matter.

That is the big problem now, and it's not going to find a quick fix no matter how much money and manpower are applied here. There's many places where helicopters with a winch and basket is the only way out because of the heavy forests- totally unlike Katrina and NOLA where they had places to land. Many of the remote mountain roads didn't see paving til 20- 30 years ago and are narrow. If they washed out or befell a landslide it will take a month or more to repair them to where one lane is passable throughout.

The movie "Deliverance" was filmed on local rivers complete with rapids, boulders, fallen trees, debris, and undercurrents. In normal times someone falling into a river here may take a day or two to find. Our usual flooding add a couple days. With Helene they will still be finding bodies or what's left of them months from now. Boats will do little outside of urban rescues and crossing lakes; this is kayak country for all but the biggest rivers like the French Broad ad Swannanoa.

Asheville proper is about 45K people in a city; go further out and the population density thins greatly making it harder to find everyone. Out there are mostly hardy mountain folk who help each other out but many will have nothing left to help with, and that's all the help they'll be getting for 1- 2 weeks because of the impossible logistics of simply getting anything or anyone there. Katrina has the casualty numbers but this is a far worse disaster by an order of magnitude.

 

[warneagle]

Fatalities from Helene of 121 (as of today) is the first 100+ fatalities from a hurricane since Ian (2022). It's very unfortunate and the majority of these were from the widespread/catastrophic flash flooding well inland. I just hope we don't exceed 1K

I've been trying to think about what could've been done better from a messaging/preparation standpoint and this is just a lot harder to deal with than hurricane impacts at the coast. It's a lot simpler to say "the hurricane will make landfall here, evacuate these counties" than it is to say "this huge area is going to get a generational flooding event, evacuate a third of an entire state".

 

[Clancy]

I've been trying to think about what could've been done better from a messaging/preparation standpoint and this is just a lot harder to deal with than hurricane impacts at the coast. It's a lot simpler to say "the hurricane will make landfall here, evacuate these counties" than it is to say "this huge area is going to get a generational flooding event, evacuate a third of an entire state".

This also very quickly turns into a case of "damned if you do, damned if you don't" because I cannot imagine the response and backlash that would occur if an evacuation of the magnitude (or even asking such a large area to conduct extensive preparations) were to take place for flood-prone areas ahead of an event and it didn't manifest as anticipated. I've seen a few mets say that flooding just isn't as "flashy" or eye-catching a threat compared to hurricanes or tornadoes, and, in personal experience, it can be especially difficult to encourage people to take action for flooding unless they've had the misfortune of experiencing the wrath of a flash flood themselves.

 

[jiharris0220]

This also very quickly turns into a case of "damned if you do, damned if you don't" because I cannot imagine the response and backlash that would occur if an evacuation of the magnitude (or even asking such a large area to conduct extensive preparations) were to take place for flood-prone areas ahead of an event and it didn't manifest as anticipated. I've seen a few mets say that flooding just isn't as "flashy" or eye-catching a threat compared to hurricanes or tornadoes, and, in personal experience, it can be especially difficult to encourage people to take action for flooding unless they've had the misfortune of experiencing the wrath of a flash flood themselves.

I’ve been saying this nearly all my life, that for meteorologist, it’s a loose-loose situation.

It’s one of the most mocked professions with people saying “it’s a job that requires you only to be right half the time”.
Even though this statement itself isn’t even true, but moving on.

The fact of the matter is that for most of meteorological disasters, “ground zero” occurs in a small area, and is essentially impossible to predict the exact location of where that may happen. So meteorologists are forced to put out maps and warnings for a wide swath of land that mostly won’t experience anything bad. Tornado outbreaks, snowstorms, hurricanes, and even flooding are something only few people will experience in a watch area.

This leads to many thinking that the meteorologist “overhyped” the events because the vast majority of the public in those watch areas didn’t actually get anything. This is why in almost every natural disaster you see people who were expecting to get nothing again get thrashed and say, “we were never warned” and people literally a few miles away saying, “yet another over blown fear mongered storm”.

Unfortunately, until the day models are advanced enough to pinpoint exact location of what areas will get hit the worst and vice versa, this loose-loose situation for meteorologists will only continue. I don’t envy their job one bit.

 

[Sawmaster]

The local forecasters for the upstate of SC made it clear that this was going to be at least as bad as Fran, Ivan, and Hugo and several also stated it could be as bad as it actually was. Everyone was talking about it and only those who don't pay attention to the weather got surprised. The utility companies weren't ready at all, but otherwise we knew, and the rest is up to us.

As to NC and TN I don't know. Asheville was well warned- I'm close enough to keep up with them so I know. Thing is there that they do see frequent flooding from spring and summer storms along with the remnants of hurricanes occasionally. Maybe they got complacent based on their experiences with that in the past but that's their fault- the forecasters did what they should have done.

Poor folk can't just jump and run to some hotel hundreds of miles away which they can't afford anyway and this is where we might do better in the future. Have safe shelters open early enough and at least some of those people will use them but if you wait till it's 24 hours before to open shelters then a lot of people aren't going to be able to use them and a lot of the rest won't bother.

 

[Sawmaster]

I’ve been saying this nearly all my life, that for meteorologist, it’s a loose-loose situation.

It's an inexact science so there's usually inexact results, but people should know and understand that by now. A large portion of people have their heads buried in the sand and a large portion ain't too bright though they think they are. I don't see how better can be done.