@ncoutdooradventures: 🌀 FIVE DAYS BEFORE HELENE… As I start pulling together photos and videos from September, I keep finding myself drawn back to September 2024 — and the days BEFORE #Helene ever arrived. This video begins 5 days before the storm and takes us through Wednesday and Thursday night, before Helene officially reached Western North Carolina. And I think that part of our story is incredibly important. 🎙️ Today I was featured on my very first podcast! One of the questions I was asked was: “What do you think people need to remember or understand about the storm?” My answer? That Western North Carolina was already flooding BEFORE Helene arrived. Our mountains had already been hammered with rain, and then Helene came. Our geography mattered, too. More than 26 inches of rain fell in parts of our region, and water poured down from some of the highest mountains in the eastern United States into the valleys below — including the place I call home: Mitchell and Yancey counties and the mighty #ToeRiver Valley. 🌧️🌊⛰️ We were among the hardest-hit communities, and understanding what happened in those days BEFORE Helene helps explain why the devastation here was so enormous. 🎙️ On the podcast, Blue Ridge Mountain Muse and I ended up chatting like two old friends for nearly an HOUR. 🤣 Good luck with that edit! We talked about Helene, our community, NC Outdoor Adventures, rebuilding, and what's happening now — including: 🍂 Our fall Leaf Waterfalls and BBQ Tour 🛶 flatwater kayaking 🕯️ The upcoming 2-year anniversary of Hurricane Helene ❤️ Helene Vigil: Remembering, Resilience & Community — The Toe River Valley on September 26 AND... 🙊😳 I finally shared a secret we've been keeping about what's coming next for our home at NCOA. You'll have to listen to the podcast for that one! There will also be a PART TWO covering the recent water-quality concerns affecting the North Toe River. 📲 Follow NC Outdoor Adventures so you don't miss the podcast and our Part 2 video: day of Helene. And if Helene touched your family, your community, or your heart, please consider joining us September 26 as we come together along the Toe River to remember those we lost, recognize how far we've come, and celebrate the resilience of the communities that survived. 🕯️❤️ #ncoutdooradventures #Helene #WNC

Eric "Doc" Waters :

Our region of WNC/Eastern Tennessee was truly devastated! Still hasn't fully recovered...

❌️HollyDean🫡 🇺🇸 ❤️🖤 :

Everytime I see these devastating memories I just cry my eyes out. If your not from here you cant even fathom how this area has changed and the lives taken were far more than officials reported. This whole area Helen hit is still so devastated. My heart aches for the missing and the ones nobody cared to count. So many homeless lived on the banks of this river. So many people have lost everything. Its heartbreaking

Admission Shopping King :

It will never be the same

Valley The Mali 🐾 Official :

Obliterated is the correct word to describe what happened to most of the hardest hit communities. Even two years later re-watching the footage and the photos I took when we were there helping the first month as boots on the ground still hurts, I can't imagine how hard it is every day for the folks that live there. I want to call WNC my home one day but for now I just come back every couple of months. I pray for Appalachia every day and urge everyone else to do the same.

LeeLeelove777 :

be careful

Straycat :

it was my birthday 9.27.. I was terrified all night now I have trama ptsd and terrified of storms

Curtis :

Damn i miss that Bridge ... my Uncle George Canipe designed and built those around Mitchell and Yancey counties... been a long 2 years

LeeLeelove777 :

wow

❌️HollyDean🫡 🇺🇸 ❤️🖤 :

DMencer :

Profanity 👎🏻👎🏻👎🏻👎🏻… so disrespectful…

Anita Coleman :

These pictures haunt me. I live on Cane River. My home place is on Bolens Creek and both places were devastated. Thank God our houses weren't swept away, but mine on Bolens Creek got foundation damage and it's not even close to the Creek! I hope we never see anything like this again

Mys.Teryna :

I was watching the flood gauge predictions and broadcasting on a radio station upstream in Transylvania County how it was going to be comparable to the great flood of 1918. Our County officials perform the first mandated evacuation in recorded history, and I only found out that Buncombe County had not been evacuated as I was posting about a feeder stream flood near my home and scrolling through Tiktok lives as my first responder family were feeding me early horror stories out of Polk County (which had also been evacuated). I saw a Tiktok live of a woman in Biltmore who had no idea the rush of water was heading her way and was too close to the river. We heard dam alarms over her video, we all were telling her to run, then we had no Communications for the next 3 days with anywhere outside of Transylvania County. Even County officials thought we were ground zero. When cell service slowly came back, we were all in shock. How could y'all not know? WHY were you not evacuated??? WHO did that to you???? 😭

targetpuppy41 :

😳😳😳