By Rich McKay, Joseph Ax and Andrew Hay
ATLANTA (Reuters) – Authorities across a wide swath of the southeastern United States on Saturday faced the difficult task of cleaning up Hurricane Helene, one of the most powerful to hit the country, as the death toll continued to rise.
At least 47 deaths were reported early Saturday and authorities feared even more bodies would be discovered in several states.
Helene, downgraded late Friday to a post-tropical cyclone, continued to bring heavy rain to several states, causing life-threatening flooding that threatened to cause dam failures that could inundate entire cities.
In Pinellas County, Florida, near Tampa, Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said he had never seen destruction like that caused by Helene. “Having spent the last few hours there, I would simply describe it as a war zone,” Gualtieri said at a news conference.
At least 3.25 million customers woke up early Saturday without power in five states, and officials warned it could take several days before services were fully restored. The worst outages occurred in South Carolina, with more than 1 million homes and businesses without power, and in Georgia, with 777,000 without power.
As of 11 a.m., the remnants of the storm were about 145 miles (235 km) southwest of Louisville, Kentucky.
Some of the worst rain hit western North Carolina, where nearly 30 inches (76 cm) of precipitation fell on Mount Mitchell in Yancey County, the NWS Weather Prediction Center reported.
Atlanta received 13 inches of rain and in South Georgia farmers were assessing damage to the state's $1 billion cotton crop, now in its harvest season.
Scientists say climate change is helping fuel stronger, more destructive hurricanes.
Before moving north through Georgia and into Tennessee and the Carolinas, Helene hit Florida's Big Bend region as a powerful Category 4 hurricane Thursday night, packing winds of 140 mph (225 kph). It left behind a chaotic landscape of overturned boats in ports, felled trees, submerged cars and flooded streets.
Police and firefighters carried out thousands of water rescues in all affected states on Friday.
More than 50 people were rescued from the roof of a hospital in Unicoi County, Tennessee, about 120 miles (200 kilometers) northeast of Knoxville, state officials said, after floodwaters inundated the rural community.
The rising Nolichucky River prevented ambulances and emergency vehicles from rescuing patients and others there, the Unicoi County Emergency Management Agency said on social media. Emergency teams on boats and helicopters were used to carry out the rescues.
Elsewhere in Tennessee, Cocke County Mayor Rob Mathis ordered the evacuation of downtown Newport due to a possible failure at the nearby Walters Dam.
The National Weather Service issued flash flood warnings overnight for a swath of eastern Tennessee covering 100,000 residents, warning them to seek higher ground. The Nolichucky Dam in Tennessee's Greene County was on the verge of collapse early Saturday, officials reported, adding that a breach could occur at any time.
On Friday, President Joe Biden added Tennessee to the long list of states under emergency declarations, freeing up federal funds and other recovery aid.
In western North Carolina, Rutherford County emergency officials warned residents near the Lake Lure Dam that it could fail, although they said Friday night that failure did not appear imminent.
Several people in and around Chimney Rock, North Carolina, described the downtown area as flattened, with online images showing inches of mud and sediment, uprooted trees, broken telephone poles and buildings reduced to rubble.
“Alright folks, listen, Chimney Rock is gone, Flowering Bridge is gone,” poster Touristpov said on TikTok, showing videos of the destruction. “I don't know what they're going to do to get us out of here.”
In nearby Buncombe County, mudslides forced the closure of Interstates 40 and 26 and parts of the roads were washed away, the county said in x.
WAKE UP TO DISASTER
The extent of the damage in Florida began to become known after dawn on Friday.
Off the coast of Steinhatchee, a storm surge (a wall of seawater pushed ashore by winds) of eight to 10 feet (2.4 to 3 meters) displaced mobile homes, the National Weather Service said on On Treasure Island, a barrier island community in Pinellas County, boats were stranded in front yards.
The city of Tampa posted on x that emergency personnel had completed 78 water rescues of residents and that many roads were impassable due to flooding. The Pasco County Sheriff's Office rescued more than 65 people.
A total of 11 people died in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis said Saturday, speaking in Perry, Florida, where 15-foot storm surges occurred, larger than hurricanes in recent years.
“If you look around, you can see that some houses are just rubble,” he said. “This thing comes, it's ferocious and it's simply unstoppable.”
Deanne Criswell, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, joined DeSantis on Saturday touring areas of the state damaged by the storm.
“I just want to say on behalf of the president that we extend our deepest condolences to those families who have lost their loved ones,” Criswell said.
Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp's office reported 15 storm-related deaths in that state, while North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper said two deaths had occurred there.
At least 19 people died during the storm in South Carolina, the Charleston-based Post and Courier newspaper reported, citing local officials.
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