Hurricane Helene | At least 44 dead and a huge wake of destruction

(Crawfordville) The hurricane Helene left a massive wake of destruction across Florida and the southeastern United States on Friday, killing at least 44 people, snapping towering oak trees like twigs and tearing apart homes as rescue teams launched desperate missions to save people from floodwaters.

Among those killed were three firefighters, a woman and her one-month-old twins, and an 89-year-old woman whose home was struck by a falling tree. According to an Associated Press tally, people lost their lives in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.

The Category 4 hurricane knocked out power to some hospitals in southern Georgia, and Gov. Brian Kemp said authorities had to use chainsaws to clear debris and open roads.

The storm was packing sustained winds of 140 mph when it made landfall Thursday evening in a sparsely populated area of ​​rural Big Bend, Florida, home to fishing villages and vacation spots.

Moody’s Analytics said it expected property damage of US$15 billion to US$26 billion.

Debris stretched hundreds of miles north to northeast Tennessee, where a “dangerous rescue situation” by helicopter unfolded after 54 people were moved to the hospital roof of Unicoi County as water quickly flooded the facility. Everyone was rescued and no one was at the hospital as of Friday afternoon, Ballad Health said.

In North Carolina, a lake featured in the film Lascivious dance overtook a dam and surrounding neighborhoods were evacuated, although there was no immediate fear of a rupture.

Residents of Newport, Tennessee, a town of about 7,000, were also evacuated due to concerns over a nearby dam, although officials later announced the structure had not failed.

Tornadoes struck some areas, including one in Nash County, North Carolina, that seriously injured four people.

Atlanta received a record 11 inches (28.24 centimeters) of rain in 48 hours, the most precipitation the city has seen in two days since record-keeping began in 1878, the Office of the California Climatologist said. State of Georgia on Platform

Climate change has exacerbated the conditions that allow these storms to develop, rapidly intensifying in warming waters and developing into powerful cyclones sometimes within hours.

The five people who died in one Florida county were in neighborhoods where residents had been ordered to evacuate, said Bob Gualtieri, the sheriff of Pinellas County in the St. Petersburg area. Some of those who remained ended up having to hide in their attics to escape the rising waters. He said the death toll could rise as teams go door to door in flooded areas.

Additional casualties were reported in Georgia, and the Carolinas, including two South Carolina firefighters and a Georgia firefighter who died when trees struck their trucks.

Video on social media showed sheets of rain and siding crashing onto buildings in Perry, Florida, near where the storm made landfall. A news channel showed a house being overturned and many communities instituted curfews.

Breakdowns and casualties

President Joe Biden said he was praying for survivors as the head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency visited the scene. The agency deployed more than 1,500 workers and participated in 400 rescues by late morning.

Authorities urged trapped people to call rescuers and not walk through floodwaters, warning that they can be dangerous due to live electrical wires, sewage, sharp objects and other debris.

More than 3 million homes and businesses were without power in Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas as of Friday, according to poweroutage.us. The site also showed power outages as far away as Ohio and Indiana due to the rapid movement ofHelene northward throughout the day.

In Georgia, an electric utility group warned of “catastrophic” damage to utility infrastructure, with more than 100 high-voltage transmission lines damaged. And officials in South Carolina, where more than 40% of customers were without power, said crews had to wade through debris just to determine what was left standing in some spots.

The hurricane made landfall near the mouth of the Aucilla River on Florida’s Gulf Coast. This location was just 32 kilometers northwest of where Idalia had struck last year with almost the same ferocity and caused considerable damage.

Weakened into a tropical storm

Shortly after crossing the land, Helene weakened into a tropical storm then into a post-tropical cyclone. Meteorologists said it continued to cause catastrophic flooding and some areas received more than a foot of rain.

Meteorologists have warned of flooding in North Carolina that could be worse than anything seen in the last century. Evacuations were underway and approximately 300 roads were closed across the state. The Connecticut Army National Guard sent a helicopter to help.

School districts and universities canceled classes. Florida airports that closed because of the storm reopened Friday. Inspectors were examining bridges and roadways along the Gulf Coast, the state’s transportation secretary said.

Helene also flooded parts of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, flooding streets and toppling trees as it brushed past the resort city of Cancun this week. It also left more than 200,000 homes and businesses in western Cuba without power.

Helene is the eighth named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, which began on 1^er June. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has predicted an above-average Atlantic hurricane season this year due to record ocean temperatures.