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    • The National Guard is rushing aid to hard-hit cities
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    The National Guard is rushing aid to hard-hit cities

    Vaseline Posted on

    For some members of the North Carolina National Guard, the mission became personal. These were their cities.

    They flew over wastelands of crushed houses, destroyed roads and downed power lines.

    From the air they could see once pristine mountain forests, devastated by mudslides and flooded rivers. Cars became stranded in streams. Collapsed bridges. Destroyed cities.

    Members of the North Carolina National Guard continued Wednesday to rush desperately needed supplies to areas devastated and cut off by Tropical Storm Helene.

    Many Western North Carolina communities are in short supply of water and food, let alone electricity and relative luxuries like internet, Wi-Fi and cell phone service — and there is no word on when these will return for thousands of residents.

    The death toll in the Southeast from the storm was at least 162 as of Wednesday, while Buncombe County, which includes Asheville, had reported 61 deaths.

    President Joe Biden visited North Carolina on Wednesday and announced he has sent 1,000 troops to bolster the North Carolina National Guard with relief efforts. The Air National Guard said Wednesday that it had so far delivered more than 100,000 pounds of food, water and other supplies for Helene’s victims.

    For some in the Guard, this week’s missions are personal.

    Chief Warrant Officer Marcus Wilkerson and his crew made a stop in a Black Hawk helicopter at his local church in the hard-hit area of ​​Fairview, southeast of Asheville

    His pastor and fellow parishioners greeted him with hugs as he and his crew unloaded supplies.

    Excited children waved and took pictures of the Black Hawk.

    In recent days, Trinity Fairview Church has been a hub where the community gathered supplies and worked on plans to reach others cut off by fallen trees and demolished roads.

    “We don’t have cell service. We haven’t heard anything,” resident Gina Fowler said. “But everyone came together.”

    Dozens of adults and even their small children formed an assembly line to unload water, meal kits and other necessities.

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    Flooding in Asheville NC: National Guard rushes in supplies by air

    Members of the North Carolina National Guard flew in needed supplies to communities cut off by Tropical Storm Helene.

    They said they were grateful to receive bottled water after drinking water from a well for several days.

    Wilkerson said he was happy that as a member of the National Guard he could personally deliver supplies to his church, but he had to fight back tears.

    “It’s hard to see them like that,” he said. “But they make it.”

    The Black Hawk circled the mountains of western North Carolina near the Tennessee border on Wednesday, looking for small towns and people in need of help. It was here in these mountain communities where monstrous amounts of rain – in some cases as much as 70 centimeters – turned rivers and streams into deadly torrents.

    “That’s where our town is up ahead,” said the pilot, Chief Warrant Officer Nathaniel Ernst, as he circled the small mountain community of Buladean in Mitchell County, about 70 miles north of Asheville.

    When they landed, they were greeted with smiles and relieved faces.

    Resident Richard Whitney said most of the city’s roads have been wiped out, with the exception of one road into Johnson City, Tennessee, which is in danger of failing.

    Whitney said the city received its first aid from the military on Tuesday and is in urgent need of water and other supplies.

    “I’ve lived on the coast and experienced hurricanes,” he said. “But there’s nothing like that.”

    Like the last-ditch town, residents quickly lined up to help unload supplies.

    A little girl stopped to give a hug to Chief Public Affairs Officer Monica Ebert, who works in her day job as a mental health professional. Ebert gave out many hugs on this day.

    “Sometimes a hug can do so much,” she says.

    The guardsmen moved on to the community of Barnardsville, with a population of about 600, just north of Asheville in hard-hit Buncombe County.

    Aaron Banks, who grew up here, moved to Tennessee with his wife, but rushed back to check on his parents after the storm. His parents were safe, but all roads into the area were destroyed.

    Banks said the community was saved when Quincey Brock, owner of Brock Mountain Land Company, who is from the city, used his company’s equipment to punch holes in the rubble and clear roads.

    “Everyone helped in their own way,” Banks said.

    Even some members of the North Carolina National Guard were concerned for their own family members.

    Sp. Cole Woodard, who was aboard the Black Hawk on Wednesday, said he received word that his parents were safe in Burnsville, a small mountain community in Yancey County. But he still hadn’t seen them.

    On Monday he was able to fly overhead as they waved at him from the ground.

    “It felt good to see them safe.”

    Vaseline
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