Hurricane Helene Archive

Stories

The Hurricane Helene Archive brings together a collection of media contributed by community members, researchers, and historians. Use this page to explore firsthand accounts, images, and documents that offer insight into the storm, its impacts, and recovery efforts.

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  Unknown

  The Aftermath of Hurricane Helene

  I remember Hurricane Helene very vividly. In the days leading up to the hurricane, I had no idea it was going to be as bad as it was. I hadn’t really been watching the news, and my mom kept texting me updates about the storm. Mind you, my family lives in the Wake Forest–Raleigh area. I remember telling her, “Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine.” She would text me incessantly again, I had no idea it was going to be as bad as it was. Nobody did. I brushed it off, thinking it was just going to be a short rainstorm. But little did I know the devastation that would follow. The night before, I didn’t think to get bottled water, non-perishables, or anything like that. All I had bought was toilet paper. I was ignorant. As anxious a person as I am, I’m usually much better at planning for the worst. This time, I wasn’t. And this time, I dealt with the consequences. The morning of September 27, my roommate and I woke up to a flooded basement. Our power had gone out. We were without food, water, or electricity. At that point, we began collecting rainwater just to have something to drink. We couldn’t call or text our families. We were completely disconnected from everyone, just the two of us, waiting for the storm to blow over. Around 4 p.m., the rain finally stopped. My roommate and I went outside to assess the damage. To the right of our house, the road above ours had collapsed, causing a major landslide that spilled into the middle of our street, blocking us in. The basement of a house below ours had flooded about five feet. The students living there had to break a window to let the water escape. Looking in the other direction, to the left of our house, a power line hung dangerously in the middle of the street. The wind had knocked over a tree, which had landed right on it. After seeing all the destruction Hurricane Helene had caused, my roommate and I began trying to clear the road so we could leave the neighborhood in search of food and water. A few of our neighbors were doing the same. As we tried to clear debris from under our car with a snow shovel, a college student from across the street approached us, asking for help. The poor guy looked pale, was shivering, clearly hungry, and dehydrated. He said he didn’t live at the house and that he was just staying with his buddies. They had no food or water, and he asked us for a ride. His car had been completely demolished. Debris, including a ping pong table, had been lodged underneath it. He couldn’t get out. His car had been parked at the house with five feet of flooding in the basement, so I could only imagine what it looked like. My roommates and I were fortunate to have only five inches of flooding. We lived in a duplex on a hill my roommate and I lived upstairs, and our two other roommates (two guys) lived on the bottom floor. Eventually, we cleared the debris from beneath our car and went in search of any places that might be open. Once we saw that there was power on campus, we stopped at The Market. Sheetz was open too, so that became our second stop, before taking the guy we helped back home. The next day, not knowing when our power would be back, I packed my things and left to stay with my family for the next few weeks.
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  Blairmont Lake

  The experience was truly wild. Being located above the floodplain and the greenway as well as right next to the hospital I often figured the storm would kind of pass us over. The storm never fully picked up until the morning of Thursday. When I woke up the water had risen another 10 feet nearly. It had to have been well over 20 feet from the floodplain. During the storm I was able to witness countless cars going by, gazebo’s, trees and so forth. It truly put the storm into perspective. I consider myself extremely fortunate to be in the area that I was in. As flat and open as the golf course was allowed the water to pass us over without decimating bridges, homes and other larger structures. The water had a way to go. I remember the water coming up over barns and well over the tops of road signs. It was also wild that no one else could have experienced what I did in that area. Everyone had a different view and situation. Standing by helpless watching everything pass was painful. Quickly after the store I remember checking on the houses close by and in the flood zone. The water and mud did not leave for months. The power lines remained across the road for up to two weeks. Being so close to the hospital I figured we would receive power quickly but it was out for a few weeks. Despite the storm I have never felt closer to my neighbors and to my community. It truly opened my eyes. Additionally going to Spruce Pine a week after to deliver supplies it blew my mind even more. There were steel I beams for factories or warehouses that were twisted like a bread tied around a 50 ft bridge, the water had come well over the top. Seeing the place that I had spent so much time visiting receiving it considerably worse than myself was hard. A bit of survivors guilt. The same for the Watuaga river past valle crucis. The flood plains truly saved my life and those around the main rivers were not so fortunate. It was heartbreaking. The video was used by some students down the mountain in Charlotte and Winston for school newspapers as the view was so alarming. It put the amount of water into perspective. I cannot imagine having being on a bend or river location.
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  Unknown

  Apartment Destruction

  At 5am on the day the hurricane first hit Boone, I felt my building shake as if an earthquake had struck. The noise was so loud I thought a bomb had gone off. A massive oak tree had completely destroyed half our apartment building, and we ran out of our room as we were hearing screaming coming from where the tree had struck. I pulled out guys from one of the apartments, and I saw that part of the tree had skewered through his bed. He was unharmed, which was a miracle from God. I will never forget that day.
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  Trees, mud and water

  Often times throughout the year in Boone, it's not uncommon for the power to go out. During the winter months the snow and ice covers the power lines and freezes the water lines. But an unclouded winter day or two usually brings the home back to normal. Normal. What isn't normal is the power going out and staying out. For 13 consecutive days. No water, no power, no wifi. Everything turned off. During the first day I thought it was just wind and rain. It was, but it was the strongest gusts and constant torrential downpour. In my parents neighborhood it took about 10 hours for the trees to start falling. And they kept falling. In the half mile circular neighborhood there were 30+ downed trees that needed clearing once the rain stopped. My stepdad, 2 of my friends and I spent 8 straight days running chainsaws and clearing logs and boughs. That was just to get a single lane wide enough to squeeze through. After the 8 days I went to Lowes to get a generator but there were none left, there were almost no saws, no shovels. Our neighbors that had no tools or gas and weren't prepared couldn't help. The elderly couldn't get care, the unfit couldn't help to clear trees. After we cleared my neighborhood to the point where trucks bigger than ours could get up and down we went out to help friends and families. Our neighborhood wasn't that bad, 8 days of work to get one lane clear wasn't that bad. Not compared to other parts of the county. We saw houses crushed by oaks or swept away completely by floodwaters. Whole hillsides were washed away by accelerated erosion. Barns that used to house precious livestock were swept away or destroyed. The storm that wasn't possible collided with my community that wasn't prepared for it. We didn't need to prepare for it. We learned in school that tornados couldn't happen in the mountains. We thought that our elevation would protect us from floods. We didn't think that storm clouds from the coast could bring the floods to us. After one year the damage has scabbed over, but it hasn't healed.
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  A Time of Uncertainty

  The night before the hurricane hit I thought everything would be okay. I’ve been through hurricanes before since my hometown is more towards the coast. They mainly dumped a lot of rain and that was the end of it. Therefore, I didn’t think this would be any different and didn’t really prepared. The school didn’t seem alarmed by it, professors just moved classes online for the day it was going to hit, and the weather station just said it would bring intense rain. The next thing I know, I have no power, no water, and no cell service. I didn’t know what was happening outside of my apartment other than what I could directly see. Trees were falling down, the rain was coming down in torrents, and the wind sounded like it would envelope us. Once the rain stopped, and I was able to go outside, that’s when I saw how bad it was. Roads had been washed away, trees were down, and homes were flooded. For the next five days my roommate and I remained without power, water, and cell service. We had to make the drive across town to campus for our first warm shower in days and this was also the first time I could actually make a call that wouldn’t immediately drop. Not to mention this was the first meal we had for at least two days. During this time of no power and water, with no access to the world around me, I was scared. I was scared for what damage was done to my apartment, what damage was done to the community, and how we were going to recover. I was a part of a large group of people that didn’t evacuate because I didn’t think it would be this bad. Afterwards, roads were closed off so I couldn’t really leave if I wanted to. I also didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to leave behind my home and my friends who were just as bad off. It was a terrifying experience that I am immensely grateful to have gotten through. Our apartment had mold damage due to all the moisture brought by the rain, all of our food that was in the refrigerator had to be thrown out, and our cars were stuck in the mud. But this was only a fraction of what other people lost. People lost everything in this storm so I’m thankful that it only impacted me minimally. However, my heart still aches for those who lost their homes and family members. It aches at the fact that there wasn’t much I could do to help since I too was stuck. And it aches at the fact that we were totally unprepared for this natural disaster. It was a terrifying and isolating experience that I can only hope we don’t have to go through again. If it does happen again, I hope we, as a community, are better prepared.
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  Interview of Caleb Hignite - BRAHM listening day - Sept 20, 2025

  This interview captures the powerful story of Caleb Hignite, a folk musician and ethnomusicologist who transformed his deep connection to Appalachian culture into a mission of documentation and advocacy following Hurricane Helene. From his roots in folk music and banjo playing to his extensive photographic documentation of the storm's aftermath, Hignite shares his experiences of witnessing devastation in rural communities like Mitchell County's Green Mountain and Red Hill. The conversation explores how traditional music provided solace during recovery, his work with the Appalachian Reclamation Alliance, and his belief that we are currently experiencing the fourth major folk revival movement in American history—one born from societal tensions and the need for authentic cultural connection.
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  Interview of Jim and Joyce Zellner - From BRAHM Hurricane Helene Listening Day in the High Country. Sept 20, 20205

  Jim and Joyce Zellner, Florida transplants who moved to the mountains of North Carolina 13 years ago, share their experience of Hurricane Helene's devastating impact on their property along Flannery Fork Creek. Despite their extensive hurricane experience from decades in Florida, nothing prepared them for watching their peaceful creek transform into a raging torrent that rose 10 feet in just three hours, flooding their party barn and isolating their community for weeks. This oral history captures their harrowing account of the storm's immediate impact—from frantically moving oriental carpets to higher ground to watching trucks and propane tanks float past their windows—as well as the long recovery process that consumed two years of their lives. The Zellners reflect on the power of community response, the emotional toll of witnessing widespread destruction, and how this mountain hurricane differed from their Florida storm experiences. Their story illuminates both the vulnerability of mountain communities to extreme weather and the resilience found in neighbors helping neighbors through unprecedented disaster.
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  Interview of Heather Higgins - Hurricane Helene Listening Day in the High Country - Sept 20, 2025

  Audio from BRAHM - Hurricane Helene Listening Day in the High Country Heather Higgins a resident of western Watauga County, shares her deeply personal account of Hurricane Helene's impact on her life and community. Living alone in a working-class area, Heather was dealing with her dying dog when neighbors gave her just 30 minutes to evacuate before roads became impassable. Her story captures the complex emotions of survival—from initial gratitude for being spared major damage to guilt over her neighbors' greater losses, and the lasting depression that followed. The interview reveals the uneven distribution of disaster impact within communities and the psychological toll of witnessing widespread destruction. Heather's experience highlights the isolation many felt when outside help was slow to arrive, leaving communities to rely entirely on each other. The centerpiece of her testimony is a haunting journal entry she wrote months after the storm, a poetic reflection on how the disaster transformed both the physical landscape and her emotional connection to the mountains she calls home. Her words capture the lasting trauma of watching "beauty buried beneath the rubble" and the ongoing struggle to process profound change in a place that once provided spiritual sustenance.