What made Hurricane Helene especially bad?

Posted on by Maria Kotolupova

Hurricane Helene presented unique challenges due to its impact on North Carolina’s mountainous terrain, bringing torrential rain and strong winds that caused severe flooding and landslides. Approximately 577,000 people (20.2%) in the 27 disaster-declared counties had high social vulnerability, making recovery particularly difficult. Governor Roy Cooper described Helene as “the deadliest and most damaging storm ever to hit North Carolina,” emphasizing the unprecedented scale of destruction. The storm struck the Blue Ridge Mountains late at night, catching many residents off guard – they did not imagine that the weather warnings could possibly mean something this bad was coming. As people often act based on past experiences and major storms typically only affect coastal regions, not mountainous, many stayed put, unable to foresee Helene’s full impact. Overall, this Hurricane demonstrated how unexpected storm patterns and high social vulnerability can significantly complicate disaster response and recovery efforts.

Resources:
https://news.asu.edu/20241003-environment-and-sustainability-lessons-helene-asu-professors-explain-complexities-behind
https://www.esri.com/about/newsroom/arcnews/navigating-devastation-gis-aids-hurricane-helene-response/
https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2024/10/hurricane-helene.html

Social Media Impacts

Posted on by Varsha Unni Krishnan

In our personal experience, some members have seen various hurricane news on various stories and reels, while others have had no news show up. We discussed what we use social media for and how we get news stories and we found that some of the people in the group get news stories from X (twitter) and commented on the speed of delivery. While others in the group said they got much of their news about natural disasters and and specifically the hurricane Helene response from Instagram.

On social media people are not looking for a discussion, influencers simply say ‘help these people’ and that doesn’t feel valuable. Something more substantial would be real people discussing the issue and something more impactful being done. We’ve found that it is unrealistic and hard to truly care about each and every social issue and find a way to support them all. The level of social awareness has numbed the true helpful response from the general public.

Specifically, the Helene response has been impactful in reaching people that can help donate and that was truly because of how disastrous it was. There are many hurricanes and natural disasters that have happened all around America and other countries and the social media response has been a bit underwhelming. So we believe the impact of social media is truly based on how it is swayed and how the public responds and boosts certain posts or ignore them in favor of a funny cat video.

Recovery Efforts: Question #7

Posted on by Myles Francisco Lawsin

Hurricane Helene had a devastating impact on Western North Carolina, with floods and mudslides destroying about 73,000 homes and displacing almost 200,000 people during peak tourism season in the region. Currently there are extensive relief efforts throughout the region, from grants to hands-on labor, many organizations are devoted to restoring Western North Carolina. Recently, local organizations were awarded almost $200,000 by the Watauga County Community Foundation for local community recovery efforts. This includes parks & rec. organizations, emergency services, and community partners. Similarly, FEMA has offered small individual payments along with efforts to restore infrastructure in the region. Currently, there are many aid organizations that are accepting donations such as American Red Cross, NC Department of Public Safety, and many others are accepting donations of any form (clothes, toiletries, etc.). Many other organizations allow volunteers to help with hands-on recovery efforts, such as Samaritan’s Purse, Hands On Asheville, and All Hands and Hearts. Our fraternity on campus at NC State (Sigma Phi Epsilon) organized a group of members to participate in the Samaritan’s Purse hands-on recovery efforts by removing debris and fallen trees from at-risk areas. Although there are many organizations committed to the recovery effort, there are still many issues that the Western North Carolina region is still dealing with. Many families are still displaced in other parts of the state, the local infrastructure is still not repaired, and local wildlife is still recovering from the devastation. Ultimately, there is still much more to be done, and the organizations listed are happy accept donations or volunteer work restore this beautiful region of our great state.

Wolfpack Athletics Hurricane Relief Drive (Social Media’s Impact)

Posted on by Justin Matthew Ratliff

By Justin Ratliff

Image of me helping load the truck of supplies to be sent to Western NC.

I choose to talk about how social media & the communitie’s impact on the relief of Hurricane Helene. We were able to raise funds and resources to give back to the people of Western NC. Using the WolfPack Image and popular images like football players we were able to share our mission. We took to instagram to ask others to donate. By using local news networks and our following on social media we were able to collect over 12 U-Haul loads of resources for people in Western NC. Our mission sparked outreach from other athletic departments and with there help we created Pack United which was established to use student athletes NIL to raise funds for the people of Western NC. We sold clothing and gathered donations which was directly donated to the American Red Cross. We were able to get other North Carolina schools to become involved in our mission. The use of social media was extremely important in our approach to raise awareness because it allowed us to reach different age groups by showing how peoples donations were taken by our players and staff and distributed to the needy in Western NC. Social media allowed us to show others how truly destructive the hurricane was to the communities in Western NC. And how others can make a difference by donating to the cause to bring back some hope for the people of Western NC.

https://www.technicianonline.com/multimedia/wolfpack-athletics-hurricane-relief-drive/collection_83cbdc52-8272-11ef-9781-834e06c4d394.html

https://gopack.com/news/2024/10/3/davin-vann-and-nc-state-football-continues-support-for-hurricane-victims

https://www.newsobserver.com/sports/college/acc/nc-state/article293230224.html

#2, #3

Posted on by Preeti Sunil Chandra

2. Who was impacted the most and how?

  • Western North Carolina
  • At least 149 deaths were reported in NC, Tennessee, and surrounding areas
  • Flooding, landslides, and winds destroyed and damaged thousands of homes and businesses
  • Loss of water and electricity has resulted in “delay in return to business”
    • Stunting economic 
  • Serious and long-term effects due to extensive roadway and bridge damage – delaying relief efforts and rescue response
    • Hurricane Helene Impacts: This website highlights the extensive and lasting impacts of hurricane helene on western north carolina. 

3. Why did it happen?

Hurricane Helene Research Assignment

Posted on by Amy Glaser

Today, we’ll be learning about Hurricane Helene. We are going to share details about what happened and how different communities were affected, updates about the recovery effort, how the public can support people affected, stories about how we were personally affected, information about how NC State has responded to the disaster, and more. You can share anything you want related to Hurricane Helene to this page.

Here are some questions you might try to answer through your research:
1. What happened? Describe the events and their impact on Western North Carolina.
2. Who was impacted the most and how?
3. Why did it happen?
4. What does the recovery effort look like in different communities?
5. How are different groups of people experiencing the effects of the hurricane differently?
6. What are some unique challenges in responding to this particular disaster?
7. What can we do to help support people in Western North Carolina?
8. What has the response to Helene been like on social media?
9. How has social media been related to the recovery effort or to the event itself and how it unfolded?
10. How did the hurricane impact you?

Do not answer all of these questions. Instead, pick one or a few that interest you, and do a deep dive into research (or in some cases self-reflection) into that issue. Then post your findings to this blog. Present the information you find in a way that is easy to read and accessible. For instance, if you want to share a website, be sure to explain what the website is and why you are sharing it. If you discover something shocking, you might write about it in a blog post. By reading this blog, viewers should become knowledgeable about the hurricane and moved to care about it. You can include any type of media (writing, photos, videos, etc.) that you want.

Be sure to cite any outside sources you use, and tag each post with the names of who contributed.