By The Guardian (World News) | Created at 2024-10-03 14:35:15 | Updated at 2024-10-18 12:25:54
2 weeks ago
A week after Hurricane Helene made landfall in the US, search and rescue teams continue to search for missing people in parts of the south-east that were devastated by the storm, as the death toll continues to rise, and as just under a million people in the region are still without power.
Officials have reported at least 191 deaths across six states as a result of the storm, and have warned that the death toll is expected to rise as many people remain missing and recovery efforts are ongoing, according to CNN.
Hurricane Helene made landfall last Thursday in Florida’s Big Bend region as a category 4 hurricane. It then weakened to a tropical storm and moved through through Georgia, the Carolinas and Tennessee, bringing strong winds, rainfall, storm surge and devastating flooding to the region, destroying communities.
The storm, described as one of the deadliest in US history, has caused power outages and disrupted cellular service in many towns and cities.
As of Thursday morning, over 350,000 people were without power in South Carolina, just under 300,000 people were without power in North Carolina, and in Georgia, around 260,000 had no power, according to PowerOutage.us.
One of the most impacted areas was North Carolina, where many residents in the mountain areas of the western part of the state have been cut off since last week, isolated without electricity or phone service due to the storm.
In Buncombe county, North Carolina, officials have reported that at least 61 people have lost their lives due to the storm. County officials said that National Guardsmen are assisting in distributing food, water and supplies to local distribution sites and shelters, as many residents remain isolated with no power and are being encouraged to conserve water.
Joe Biden is set to visit Georgia and Florida on Thursday to assess the damage there caused by the hurricane. This follows the US president’s visit to the hurricane-affected areas of North and South Carolina on Wednesday.
Biden has approved federal disaster assistance for survivors in designated counties in Florida, Georgia North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.
On Wednesday, Deanne Criswell, theFederal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) administrator, also announced that Biden has also made additional disaster assistance available to the states of North Carolina, Georgia, and Florida as emergency responders continue working to address the immediate needs of survivors and their communities.
The Biden administration has stated that over 4,800 personnel from across the federal workforce are deployed to the impacted areas across the country, with over 1,000 from Fema.
On Wednesday, Biden directed the defense department to deploy up to 1,000 active-duty soldiers to reinforce the North Carolina national guard, to help deliver supplies, food and water to isolated communities.
More than $10m has been provided directly to those affected by the storm, the Biden administration said, and as of Wednesday, the government said that Fema had shipped over 8.8m meals, more than 7.4m liters of water, 150 generators and more than 225,000 tarps to the region.
Search and rescue teams have conducted nearly 1,500 structural evaluations and hundreds of rescues and evacuations, homeland security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said this week.
He added that almost 6,000 members of the national guard were deployed across the six states affected by the storm.
On Wednesday, Harris visited Augusta, Georgia, to survey the devastation caused by the storm.
The US vice-president and Democratic nominee is scheduled to visit North Carolina in the coming days. Donald Trump, the Republican presidential candidate and former president, visited Georgia earlier this week.
As of Thursday morning, several areas in Florida, Georgia, Tennessee and Virginia were under boil water advisories and water conservation orders due to the storm.
Experts have said that understanding the storm’s damage may take weeks, as the communities most affected are difficult to reach.
