The toll from the devastating Storm Helene has now reached at least 53 fatalities, authorities reported, as rescue teams, hindered by washed-out bridges and debris-laden roads, conducted house-to-house searches for survivors in the ravaged areas of multiple eastern US states.
According to updated figures compiled by AFP, at least 22 individuals lost their lives in South Carolina, 17 in Georgia, 11 in Florida, two in North Carolina, and one in Virginia.
Helene struck Florida late Thursday as a Category 4 hurricane, moving northward while gradually losing strength, yet leaving a trail of unprecedented destruction.
This morning, repair teams commenced work, with the National Weather Service indicating that conditions would “continue to improve today following the severe flooding experienced over the past two days.”
As of mid-afternoon Saturday, nearly three million customers remained without power across ten states, stretching from Florida in the southeast to Indiana and Ohio in the Midwest, according to data from poweroutage.us.
Helene left a chaotic scene of overturned boats in harbors, illustrating the storm’s fury.
The storm made landfall on Florida’s northern Gulf coast with powerful winds reaching 225 kilometers per hour.
Even in its weakened post-tropical cyclone form, it has caused significant damage.
Record flooding levels had posed risks of dam breaches; however, Tennessee emergency officials reported that the Nolichucky Dam, once at risk of failing, is now stable, allowing residents downstream to return home.
Asheville, a city in western North Carolina, experienced massive flooding.
Governor Ray Cooper described Helene as “one of the worst storms in modern history” to impact his state.
In South Carolina, known for experiencing hurricanes, some residents claimed Helene was the most severe storm in 40 years.
Reports surfaced of remote towns in the Carolina mountains experiencing power outages and lacking cell service, with roads rendered impassable by mudslides.
In Cedar Key, a small island community of 700 off Florida’s northwest coast, the hurricane’s full destructive force was evident.
Officials urged residents in Helene’s path to heed evacuation orders, with National Hurricane Center Director Michael Brennan labeling the storm surge as ‘unsurvivable.’
Several pastel-colored wooden homes were swept away, casualties of record storm surges and intense winds.
“I’ve lived here my whole life, and it breaks my heart to see it. We’ve not really been able to catch a break,” said Gabe Doty, an official from Cedar Key, referring to two earlier hurricanes in the past year.
President Biden described the damage as ‘overwhelming.’
In South Carolina, the fatalities included two firefighters, as reported by officials.
Among Georgia’s 17 deaths was an emergency responder, according to state reports.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis stated that the destruction from Helene surpassed that of hurricanes Idalia and Debby, both of which struck the same region southeast of Tallahassee in the last 13 months.
“It’s a real gut punch to those communities,” DeSantis remarked in an interview with Fox News.
On the affluent Anna Maria Island, south of Tampa, nearly every ground-level home faced flooding, with coastal roads buried under several feet of sand, as reported by the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.
In the town of Erwin, Tennessee, a dramatic rescue operation unfolded as over 50 patients and staff trapped on a hospital roof by rising floodwaters were airlifted to safety by helicopters.
People were seen throwing buckets of water out of homes in Georgia in response to flooding.
The remnants of the weakened storm continued to release rainfall over the lower Midwest on Saturday.
In a statement, President Joe Biden characterized Helene’s devastation as “overwhelming.”
He announced the deployment of additional response personnel and dispatched Deanne Criswell, the administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Administration, to Florida to assess the damage.
FEMA currently has more than 800 personnel stationed in the storm-affected regions.
September has been marked by unusual rainfall globally, with scientists attributing some extreme weather events to human-induced climate change.
