Feeling Helene's wrath, former Long Islanders in N.C. struggle in hurricane's aftermath

The widespread devastation Hurricane Helene wreaked across Sharon Cantor-Fahrer's Asheville, North Carolina, community is unlike anything the former Long Islander has ever witnessed.

Scores of residents died in a catastrophic flood. Entire swaths of neighborhoods in the Tar Heel State's largest mountain city were annihilated by floodwaters, including thousands of homes and businesses.

Much of the region on Tuesday was still without power, cellphone or internet service and locals had little access to gasoline or groceries days after the storm made landfall in the area late Thursday as a Category 4 hurricane.

"It's a catastrophic occurrence," said Cantor-Fahrer, who grew up in Bay Shore and lived in Syosset before moving to the city's neighborhood of West Asheville, in the Blue Ridge Mountains, 28 years ago. "It's a 1-in-1,000-year flood. And we won't really know the whole devastation until the river goes down."

The Federal Emergency Management Agency reported Tuesday it had delivered roughly 1 million liters of water and more than 600,000 meals to North Carolina residents.

Cantor-Fahrer, 75, who operates walking tours of Asheville, is one of the lucky ones. She said Monday her home still was intact and unlike most of her neighbors, her electricity and cell service had been restored already.

But Cantor-Fahrer said she had been without running water since Friday and was using 65-gallon rain barrels to wash dishes and flush the toilet. Water pipes, she said, are broken across the city but utility workers are unable to repair them because most of the infrastructure is still under water.

"They've just now begun to distribute bottled water," she said Monday. "The highways were closed in three directions so it was difficult for the supplies to even get in here ... There are tons of trees down. There's landslides and road collapses."

Death toll tops 160

By Tuesday evening, the death toll from Helene, one of the worst storms in U.S. history, totaled at least 166 lives lost in six Southeastern states. The physical damage stretched from the Gulf Coast of Florida to Virginia's Appalachian Mountains.

North Carolina appeared to have suffered some of the most extensive impact — including nearly half of all deaths from the storm. State officials said they expected those numbers to rise in the coming days. 

The death toll in and around Asheville, a popular tourist mountain town located in Buncombe County, was at least 57 people, officials reported Tuesday. Search and rescue operations remain active, county officials said, with teams continuing to reach individuals still trapped by the storm’s aftermath.

"Communities were wiped off the map," North Carolina’s Gov. Roy Cooper said at a news conference on Tuesday.

In total, more than 380,000 customers were without power across North Carolina on Tuesday, including more than 100,000 in Buncombe County, according to PowerOutage.us. 

President Joe Biden is planning to travel to North Carolina on Wednesday, according to the White House. North Carolina officials said he is expected to fly over Asheville as limited highway access would make traveling with his motorcade a logistical challenge.

Nicole Case, 32, who grew up in Ronkonkoma and moved to Asheville in 2019, broke down in tears Tuesday as she described the damage to her community.

"The devastation is heartbreaking," said Case. "There are places gone forever that will never be able to come back. There are roads that we drove regularly and they're gone. All these little mountain towns have been wiped off the map."

Case's home in the southern section of the city that she shares with her husband and their two young children, and where she operates a bakery business, survived the storm, although they've been without electricity, water or cell service since Friday.

A hot yoga studio the former Long Islander owns in Asheville is intact, and the home her father, a former Garden City police officer, and mother, a homemaker, own in nearby Flat Rock was spared the worst of the damage. 

But the home of Case's in-laws in Hendersonville, south of Asheville, was destroyed.

"They had catastrophic flooding," said Case, who has been working to help organize relief efforts in the community. "Their house was underwater. They've lost everything. We spent our weekend helping them salvage and save as much as they can."

Helen Weinstein, 60, who moved to Fletcher, about 15 miles south of Asheville, in 2021 after living in Roslyn and Cold Spring Harbor, said damage from Helene appears far worse than what she saw after Superstorm Sandy in New York in 2012.

"I lived by the bay during Sandy and kayaked on our road," she said. "So I know what that was like and this is probably 10 times worse. We live in an area very different from Long Island. People live in mobile homes and this is a mountainous area. If you’re living in a mobile home in the valley, you’re not there anymore."

Weinstein said her home avoided serious damage although her farmland where she keeps goats, sheep and chickens flooded.

Neighbors, she said, have been helping each other clear debris with chain saws.

"The wonderful part of tragedy is that the community comes together," Weinstein added.

Left New York for 'farm life dream'

Kara Ryan, 39, of Lynbrook, said Monday she hadn't spoken with her parents in Burnsville, North Carolina — located about 40 minutes north of Asheville and southeast of the Tennessee border — since Friday when her mom said the lights were flickering and their basement was taking on water.

Ryan finally saw a Facebook post Sunday evening that her parents, Bruce and Maryann Montreuil, 66 and 61, respectively, were safe.

"All I’ve heard is that they’re safe and OK," said Ryan, who had been contemplating driving to her parents but was deterred by road closures near the state line. "I am a shell of a person. There is nothing I can do right now. The roads are treacherous, and I can’t go down there."

The family weathered Sandy in New York, but Ryan said images of the damage she's seen in North Carolina look more like New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Most of Burnsville, she said, has been cut off from supplies. With cellphone service gone, some residents have gathered near the town square to send messages via Wi-Fi to a Facebook group — Burnsville Hub — which is disseminating information. One grocery store is serving customers, but only accepting cash, and the pumps at several gas stations have run dry, Ryan said.

Her parents moved to North Carolina about nine years ago after spending their lives in Queens and live on a sprawling property with 6 dogs, 7 cats, sheep, goats, chickens, quails and a rabbit.

"They left Queens for the farm life dream," Ryan said. "This whole area is never going to be the same. They have no power, cell service, 911 or water. People don’t have cash. There’s no gas. It’s terrible."

Pam Mattia of Bethpage, 61, faced similar anxieties while waiting desperately for news about her sister, Donna Rogan, 59, who lives by herself in a trailer park in Asheville. The siblings grew up in Amityville.

On Monday, Mattia said she finally received word from a friend of her sister that Rogan, who suffers from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, was safe although without electricity or cell service.

"I'm very relieved that she's fine and that she's not injured. Her trailer is still livable," Mattia said of her sister, who moved to the region 40 years ago. "But, I'm just worried for the lack of rations and of water. It's very scary. I don't think people realize how bad it is down there. It's biblical down there. You can't even imagine."

With The Associated Press

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story misidentified Pam Mattia.