Above: map of the French Broad River, which runs through the center of Asheville, NC, drawn by William Neely
[NORTH CAROLINA]
I moved to North Carolina in 1981 and visited the Appalachian Mountains as a teen, staying at my friend’s parents’ cabin in a tiny mountain town. My best friend went to ASU in Boone. When I met my future wife in 1988, the first thing she wanted to do was take me camping on Mt. Mitchell. Our honeymoon was spent in the picturesque town of Cashiers. A drive on the Blue Ridge Parkway served as a therapeutic getaway for us more than a few times.
Back in the mid-90’s my wife and I loved western NC so much that we seriously considered moving to Asheville. Now our decision to remain in Chapel Hill seems more fateful than ever.
When I think of western North Carolina I can’t help but immediately think of William Neely, who almost singlehandedly birthed the river tourism and sports industry in NC by meticulously mapping the major rivers in the area – by hand (see above). As a kid in Chapel Hill these posters were a regular sight around town, even if the places they illustrated seemed very remote, which indeed they were.
Neely’s posters and unique, detailed cartoon work dedicated to outdoor sports are still for sale, but unhappily the artist himself passed away years ago. I was fortunate to get to know his lifelong partner Holly before she died.
Now much of the region that Neely loved and illustrated has been utterly destroyed.
By now you know the story, but it’s difficult to imagine the scope of it all. The region’s infrastructure is destroyed. It’s not the same as coastal flooding: what happened in western NC was infinitely more dangerous. The torrential rain brought down massive landslides on top of occupied homes. People stranded on rooftops drowned when the roof collapsed. There are stories of people literally being swept away in their homes, because the incredible force of the water took entire homes along with it, those that it didn’t smash.
We looked outside and there was a 30-foot-tall wall of water and rocks and tree debris just coming at us… And we all got washed downriver. – John Norwood to ABC News
Bridges, roads, entire neighborhoods, whole downtown areas, gone. And that’s only what we know about. NC DOT continues to declare all roads in the region closed to everything but emergency and volunteer traffic. Countless neighborhood streets, driveways, dirt roads and the incredible network of state roads – built decades ago – that winds through the peaks and valleys of this very difficult region and keeps it all connected are blocked by piles of trees, landslides or debris, damaged, or just gone. Western NC is all but completely cut off except by air.
The water system in Asheville is destroyed. The cellular networks in the entire region are destroyed. There is almost no communication with the outside world.
Anywhere from 8 to just under 30 (!) inches of rain fell in the mountains of North Carolina. Rivers crested at over 27 feet. Dams overtopped. All of the waterways, big and small, that have so charmed and thrilled generations, the majestic hills and endless vistas of pine-covered slopes that have hosted and inspired countless hikers, skiers, mountain bikers, poets, artists, craftspeople, musicians and writers – myself included – became a deadly trap in a matter of moments.
There was so much water. Yet perhaps worst of all, now there is no water for people to drink. The toxic brown water that levelled entire towns and neighborhoods is itself dangerous in the extreme. Videos have shown trucks, cars, gas tanks, even entire homes being carried away by the force of the current. Every commercial structure, facility, gas station or store that’s under water or was filled with water has released an unprecedented stream of waste, large and small.
The badly strained local officials in the area are all using adjectives like “biblical” and “apocalyptic” to describe the situation, but according to some of the interviews I’ve listened to with people who made it through, even those words aren’t sufficient. News footage shows an endless stream of dejected, hungry, thirsty and very worried, if not panicked, people who have lost literally everything except the clothes on their backs. They have no homes, no food, no car, no phone and no idea what to do or what comes next. Many cannot reach their loved ones.
What we are experiencing is a region-wide apocalyptic flooding disaster, and as I sit here on Monday, we still cannot place cell phone calls to basic services to help communicate, so everything is slower and less efficient because of cell service, Zeb Smathers, Mayor of Canton, NC – WRAL
Meanwhile, supplies are being airlifted in to the region, and there are many stories emerging of heroic rescues by neighbors and individuals, as well as acts of community kindness, like the restaurant owner who gathered up whatever the other restaurants in his ruined town had left and cooked it up and gave it away to people so it wouldn’t spoil.
But there are many others who are scavenging ruined stores for anything to eat or drink, or risking their lives in the toxic waters just to flush toilets or hopefully boil some water for drinking – but there is little to no fuel or gasoline available either. And there are countless more people, whose numbers we’ll learn in sad time, who are isolated, in need of medicine they can’t get or electricity for life saving home devices, or just out of food and water, trapped in their homes and cut off from the world until the rescuers can cut their way through to them. Not just in the remote mountain villages. Everywhere, across the region.
And there are those, and everything with them, who were swept away.
“Chimney Rock’s gone. Flowering Bridge is gone,” Luther says in the video. “I’m not sure what they’re going to do to get us out of here.” – Banff Luther on Storyful
It’s not an emergency, it’s a catastrophe. This extreme tragedy has already redefined the way I think about climate change. It’s no longer just a matter of changing climate, but the changes that climate is increasingly brutally inflicting upon us. A major hurricane has destroyed a mountain region hundreds of miles from its landfall. This is not a question of opinion. It is unfolding before our eyes, and unlike some politicians crassly and heinously suggest, both the pain and the assistance are being doled out in equal measure regardless of party affiliation, ideology or belief.
The change is wrought, and for thousands and thousands of people in NC it will in many cases be not only profoundly painful, but permanent.
Cover Image: Map of the French Broad River by William Neely
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