More Than a Month Later, Communities Struggle to Rebuild After Hurricanes Helene and Milton

For the first two days after Hurricane Helene, Ken Floyd, a 41-year-old general manager of the Monte Vista Hotel in Black Mountain, North Carolina, was in a state of stress. The father of three was trapped at home with his family as a landslide rampaged the surrounding area, taking down trees and impacting roads, barring his ability to check in on others. “It was just a constant worry of when can we get out of here?” says Floyd. “I was worried and concerned about my staff at the hotel. I wanted to make sure everybody was okay.”

Monte Vista Hotel became a meeting point for the community after two managers sprung into action to feed hungry guests. “About two days later, I was able to finally get out…and they had turned feeding those 10 guests to feeding the entire town,” Floyd says. “I saw hospitality at its heart. I've been doing this for 20 years, and I saw it at its heart for really the first time that day.”

But despite local efforts for recovery, some residents feel frustrated by delays in federal aid—and worry whether the government will meet the moment. “This was a 1000-year storm,” says Floyd, echoing meteorologists who have said the chances of a hurricane like Helene, with such rainfall, had less than a 0.1% chance of happening in any given year. Floyd, who is calling for greater financial support from state and federal officials, including FEMA, says that rebuilding efforts post-storm are difficult given the new hurricane-resistant construction guidelines they must follow and delays in federal assistance. “People are trying to go back in and rebuild and fix their houses, and now they're being told they have to elevate it or they can't build it all,” he says.

More than 100 people in the state—and at least 228 across the U.S.—died due to the storm, nearly half of which came from Buncombe County, the western North Carolina county home to the small mountain town of Black Mountain. The region was devastated by Hurricane Helene on Sept. 28, with some nearby communities, like Busick, North Carolina reporting more than 30 inches of rainfall, which caused historic rates of flooding. North Carolina’s Budget Office estimated recovery would cost some $53 billion to help repair the more than 600 bridges destroyed, 7,000 sites of road damage, and more.

The effects of Helene extend past North Carolina. Hurricane Helene made landfall near Perry, Florida as a Category 4 hurricane on Sept. 26, bringing 15 feet of storm surge to the Big Bend, according to preliminary data, before impacting Georgia, South Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee and Alabama as well.

After Helene, Milton, a Category 3 hurricane, arrived on Oct. 9, further damaging Florida and causing 150 tornado warnings in the state.

“We always find ways to recover but this last one, or the last two, was kind of a one-two punch between Helene and Milton,” says David Buzza, a 65-year-old based in Madeira Beach, Florida, whose home was destroyed by the storm surge. “It's the first time we've had direct hits.”

In the immediate aftermath of the storms, FEMA provided $750 serious needs assistance to help affected individuals across the U.S. pay for food, water, and other disaster-related goods. And in the weeks since Hurricane Helene, FEMA has given out $883 million in individual assistance and $524 million in public assistance. Some residents have reported delays. “To date, I've not received one penny from FEMA. I have received a penny from my insurance carrier. We've been assessed. We made the claim the day after [the hurricane]. And here we sit,” says Buzza, who was approved for FEMA aid in mid October. Buzza has invested at least $75,000 to help repair his home, he says. “How many people you know can do that?”

In response to questions about delays, FEMA said that once a survivor is approved for assistance, they should receive direct deposits within 3 business days or 7-10 business days if they opted for a check. They pointed applicants to the DisasterAssistance.gov portal, FEMA app, or FEMA Helpline (1-800-621-3362) to check in on their application status.

Floyd says that FEMA officials, who came to visit the community, have done a good job in sending linement to restore cell towers and power. In fact, FEMA has restored power across 99% of households and approximately the same percentage of cellular sites. But Floyd and others think the federal presence arrived too late. “We were seeing an influx of volunteers from other states, from: Vermont, New Jersey, Illinois, Indiana, Virginia, Alabama, people coming from all over, to help us in the first couple of weeks, before I even saw a FEMA official,” he says. 

Five weeks later, residents are still navigating life post-hurricane amid an uncertain restoration timeline. Both Black Mountain and Madeira Beach have local economies that depend on tourism. Floyd, who serves on the local chamber board, says that local officials are working hard to try to help businesses, but the storm’s impact is massive. “We're hoping that we'll be able to kind of get some of that [tourism] back, but we don't know,” says Floyd. “I grew up in Florida, so I'm familiar with how hurricanes impact areas. I've never seen anything like this before.”

Alex Matisse, founder of East Fork Pottery in Asheville, North Carolina, says that his production facilities were fortunate enough to not be impacted by the storm. The town was hit hard by Helene and had already received significant rainfall prior to the hurricane, making the soil oversaturated and causing the French Broad Rivers to overflow, cutting out power, and impacting cell tower lines. The lack of electricity made it impossible to make new dinnerware, but East Fork Pottery was still able to sell existing pottery online.

“We did this big sale…and people showed up,” says Matisse. “[That] let us keep our people on payroll when so many people in Asheville were immediately laid off, especially because so much of this is tourism driven. Restaurants, hotels, all of those businesses closed immediately.”

East Fork Pottery has employed 19 additional workers to help fulfill the surge of orders they’ve received in the aftermath of the hurricane. But Matisse is worried about other local business owners. “One of the biggest struggles is that Asheville is a ghost town and October is [usually] the busiest season—it's where everybody basically makes their profit for the year.” Asheville saw water restored a week ago, but residents are still under a boil water notice. While local businesses may want to re-open, Matisse points out that the cost of doing so is a massive undertaking. Restaurants need to buy all of their food again and start people on payroll without a guarantee that customers will arrive. Some hotels, he says, have been able to reopen by purchasing “massive tanks” for potable water that Matisse says charge 10 cents per gallon and $600 for every tank delivery.

The physical reminders of the hurricane have also affected residents. Buzza’s Florida home is in a high humidity climate, which, when combined with flooding, made his house a burgeoning habitat for mold. While he’s working on home restorations to make his home livable, he says some of his neighbors have not taken those precautions because of the lack of information regarding home remediation after flooding. And besides fears about unsafe living conditions due to mold in homes, the 12-foot-long pile of debris outside his home is a grim reminder of the last five weeks. “Going through [the hurricane] and then continuing to see [the debris] in your face every single day is extremely difficult to emotionally deal with,” says Buzza.

Pinellas County, where Buzza lives, said in a mid-October announcement that debris pickup would be a “major operation that will take months to complete. The county estimates there are approximately 1 million cubic yards of residential debris just in the unincorporated areas (not including the cities).” The city of Madeira Beach alone has collected more than 20,000 cubic yards of debris as of the latest report on Oct. 22. However, residents remain frustrated. “I understand it's a huge, huge task for FEMA to take on, but at the same time, this isn't the first rodeo,” says Buzza, who is considering paying for the private removal of the debris. “There's been other big storms, so I don't understand the breakdowns in the debris removal and the flow of money to people.”

Matisse reports similar wait times for debris pick-up in Asheville, which he says adds a “very eerie feeling in so many places.” Landscape changes have also been haunting. “So many natural places have changed so much—places that were for refuge. Rivers have changed, hiking trails have changed with landslides. There’s so much of that as well.”

Overall, some residents say that while officials have ensured that there is sufficient food and connected those in need with temporary housing, greater immediate financial investment is necessary. Floyd fears that FEMA assistance, which caps at $43,500 per person, will be insufficient as some insurance companies are not covering water damage from the hurricane. “You hope there's going to be a lot of other agencies out there that can assist,” he says, “because I don't think FEMA is going to be able to help as much as they should.”