Hurricane Helene - One Year Later

On the evening of Thursday, September 26, 2024, many people in the Southeastern United States went to bed not realizing just how bad Hurricane Helene was about to be. What transpired over the following week humbled many of us and made us realize just how much we had taken for granted.

Like so many others, I hadn't prepared at all. I hadn't bought bottled water, I hadn't stockpiled anything, it had barely even registered to me that a hurricane was coming. I lived in the foothills of South Carolina and the worst thing we ever got from a hurricane was a few days of heavy rain. I didn't live in a flood zone, and if we got to a point where my house flooded, we were too late to build an ark.

The first signs that this storm might be worse than others came on Wednesday after school. We received an email from the school administrators that we would be having an e-learning day on Friday. When I was growing up in the 90s, school wasn't cancelled until their was snow on the ground, and we NEVER cancelled for a hurricane. Post-COVID and with the ability to do work online, schools are much more willing to call for an e-learning day. Personally, I'm not mad; cancelling in-person to avoid the risk of someone getting injured is honestly a better idea. However, we've been conditioned to expect an e-learning day even when conditions aren't really that bad. We turned off our alarms after we got up on Thursday in anticipation of an easy Friday.

Friday, September 27

Come Friday morning, I woke up to some fairly intense wind and no power. No big deal. I wasn't naive enough to think we wouldn't lose power. We sometimes lose power when it seems completely calm outside, I knew the risk was there. I informed my team from my phone that I wouldn't be available for a little while due to a power outage taking my internet down. I fully expected that by early afternoon, the power would be back on and the internet would swiftly follow suit.

Since I couldn't really get much work done, I decided to take the dog out and survey the damage. There were several trees in the woods behind our house just completely ripped up from their roots. Fortunately, none fell toward our house, but they were absolutely tall enough to have hit us if they fell that direction. A normally dry creek bed was a foot or more deep, with water flowing concerningly fast. It wasn't even raining very hard, so I was puzzled with how our backyard had become a river. Alas, I didn't want to hang around for another tree to possibly fall on me, so we got back inside pretty quickly.

While sitting inside and looking out the window because we didn't have anything better to do, we saw the trampoline in our back yard get picked up a few feet and thrown across the yard. Fortunately, it was parallel to the house and it didn't hit anything, but what if another gust threw it at us and possibly through a window? I went outside with the plan to flip it over so that it couldn't be picked up as easily. It took some fighting with a 2x4 and slipping in the mud, but I finally got it fully inverted. No way I was letting a trampoline beat me.

By about noon, it occurred to me that without power, we wouldn't be able to cook any food. I thought about using my grill, but we didn't have any propane, and I was sure everyone would be rushing to buy what was available at stores nearby. I pulled the Solo Stove out and set it up just outside my garage. This allowed me to get a fire started with some fatwood fire starter and what dry-ish sticks I could scrounge together, while still sitting in the garage and out of the misting rain. With some upturned cinderblocks and a camping grate, I had a functional outdoor cooking station.

I threw on some hotdogs and we had lunch. To keep the refrigerator and freezer as cold as possible, we tried to open it as seldom as we could, and only with an explicit plan of what we needed. With the hotdogs already cooked and no way to save them for later, we had those for dinner as well. Between lunch and dinner, we worked on the e-learning worksheets that the kids received on Thursday and I did what work I could without an internet connection.

As evening approached, we began to get a little concerned. We hadn't been without power for a full day or more in several years. We hadn't charged any devices, power banks, or flashlights in anticipation of the hurricane. We did have some candles, and the kids love board games and card games, so we had plenty of things to keep us busy without power. As the sun set, we played Uno by candlelight before bed.

Without power, it was pitch black in the house, and the kids were already iffy about dark rooms to begin with. We moved their mattresses into our bedroom and set up an electric lantern to give some faint light. It wasn't super hot, but the house had begun to heat up a bit. While our bedroom was normally cooled to 69 degrees, without air conditioning it was closer to 75. Not miserable by any stretch of the imagination, but warmer than I like to be when I try to sleep. Eventually, we all drifted off.

Saturday, September 28

Saturday morning had the benefit of being a weekend. We didn't have school or work for a whole two days, so that should be ample time for the line workers to get the power back on before we had any responsibilities. Until then, it would be like an unexpected camping trip. We still had plenty of food left in the fridge, and while I could keep the fire going, we still had the ability to cook.

My mother-in-law came over with bacon, eggs, and instant coffee. I stoked the fire under the camping grate and cooked breakfast for everyone. While the bacon and eggs were cooking, I boiled some water in a stainless steel pot. The bottom was completely covered in thick, black soot, but that first cup of coffee in over a day hit my soul. I would gladly clean up whatever I had to once we had power again, just don't take my coffee.

With breakfast handled and nothing much to do for the rest of the day, we decided to go exploring. If we could find ice, that would let us keep things cold for a while longer, and I wanted to fill up my jerrycan with gasoline in case stations started to run out. Plus, if we could get our hands on a generator, I could run that off some fuel and at least keep the chest freezer going. Even if we lost everything in the main refrigerator/freezer, we had a ton of expensive meat in the chest freezer and I assumed the insulation was much better.

We heard that Simpsonville had power in at least parts of town, so we headed that direction. The QuikTrip had a line through the parking lot, onto the main road, and backed up nearly to the interstate, so we assumed they had both fuel and power. We got in line and waited nearly an hour, but we were able to leave with a full ice chest, a full tank in the car, and a full jerrycan.

As we headed back home, we took the scenic route to see how bad the damage was. Several roads were nearly unrecognizable. Sheds and carports were picked up and tossed aside. Street signs were bent completely over and often pulled out of the ground. Fallen trees made several roads fully blocked. One tree fell onto the trailer of a big rig, rendering it completely immobile. I'm just glad it didn't fall on the cab, or fall too close in front for the driver to stop in time. Powerlines were pulled to the ground by trees, and some power poles were snapped like twigs. I could tell then that we wouldn't be getting electricity back on in my rural area for quite some time.

Early Saturday afternoon, we got an email from the school informing us that they would be closed on Monday and Tuesday. While I was hoping we would be back to normal before then, it was nice to know we had more time available before we had to figure out how to get everyone ready with no electricity.

We were coming to terms with the fact that most of the cold goods were going to be spoiling soon. The chest freezer would likely be fine for a few days more, but basically everything in our inside fridge and freezer were going to need to be used or thrown away soon. My mother-in-law had a few steaks from her freezer that were beginning to thaw, so we went head and grilled them that evening. Looking back, I wish we would have committed then to eating the meat that was starting to thaw in our own freezer. We ended up tossing a nauseating amount of food that could've been delicious, but we were trying to hold out hope that the power would come back on and we could preserve some.

Sunday, September 29

By Sunday, we were starting to get into a more comfortable routine. My mother-in-law would come over, I would cook breakfast over the Solo Stove and get some water boiling for coffee. Coincidentally, I had purchased a Lodge cast iron 5.5 quart enameled Dutch oven from Walmart just a few weeks earlier on August 16. The capacity, the heat retention, and the sturdy handles made it perfect for heating water over the fire. I would fill it with water in the morning while I cooked breakfast and keep it warm all day. If we needed hot water for coffee or to wash dishes, I would pour some off. If it started getting low due to boiling or using the water, I would add more and keep it on the heat to warm back up. I cannot underscore how fortuitous that purchase was. Everybody needs a Dutch oven, and it was invaluable with the primitive cooking situation.

Our daily ritual of exploring started to turn increasingly dystopian. Most gas stations were closed either because they ran out of fuel or because they had no power to run their point-of-sale systems. The ones that were open had huge lines of vehicles trying to compete for a handful of available pumps. Most stores had signs in their windows that advertised the lack of ice and propane. Grocery store shelves were nearly bare, especially the bread aisles. Restaurants that did have power were one of the few options available for people who didn't have the tools or ability to cook at home, so the wait would approach nearly an hour for some places. We got Culver's and picked up a pizza while in town, but conditions were looking more desperate each day.

Sunday evening, it occurred to me that our Nintendo 3DS would be perfect for energy-conscious entertainment. I could play some for the kids to watch after we finished our nightly Uno games, then charge it in the car while we drove around the next day. It certainly wasn't the exquisite electronic stimulation that we were used to, but it was nice to have a sense of normalcy when we settled in for the night. I started a new run through "The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask" and got a pretty good way through the game before the power came back on.

I should mention that communications were mysteriously unreliable. Not only were phones unable to get consistent service with cell towers, 911 was also simply unavailable. I'm not sure if it's because power was unavailable for the towers, or if fallen trees had damaged the communication lines running to them, but phones were basically useless. We might get a text message in or out a few times per hour, but calls were unintelligible and mobile data was barely a trickle. Even checking in on family and friends was prohibitively difficult.

Unexpected Visitor

Around this time (I'm not exactly sure when), we had a very eventful night. Long after we had all gone to sleep, we woke up to the dog barking like crazy. He will occasionally bark at a stray cat or animal in the yard, but rarely is it so consistent and frenzied. That seemed like a bark reserved for people. I got out of bed and went to the front door. Sure enough, a car was parked in our driveway with their running lights on. It was nearly midnight, and we live down a very long driveway, so I couldn't imagine who would be so bold or so stupid to pull up at a random house in the middle of the night when tensions are already so high.

I went back to the bedroom and told my wife that a car was outside. I got my handgun and a flashlight and returned to the door. I pointed the flashlight directly at the driver's seat to let this interloper know they were seen. In my boxers, with a tactical stance and holding the gun in my right hand and flashlight in my left, I went outside to engage with this unexpected visitor.

As soon as I opened the door, I heard, "hey man, it's me." It was my brother-in-law. "I'm almost out of gas, thought you might have some extra." Obviously defused, I removed the round from the chamber and set to work filling his car from my jerrycan. "Hey, text your sister so she doesn't worry," I told him. It didn't occur to me that we hadn't been able to get messages in or out reliably for days.

He explained that he was trying to get some gas and thought that the crowds might be down some with it so late at night. While the crowds were gone, yes, so were the employees. Every gas station between his house and ours was closed. He came to our house as a last ditch effort just to get enough gas to get home. I told him that I almost shot him, and he understood my concern. That's why he yelled to me right when I opened the door.

After he had enough gas to at least get home, I sent him on his way with some pinto beans we had cooked in the Dutch oven. It wouldn't last long without refrigeration, and I wanted to help out where I could. Family has to be fed, you know? When I got back inside, my wife told me she figured if she hadn't heard gunshots, our guest was probably somebody we knew or at least someone without malicious intent. Oh yeah, she didn't get the text message.

Monday, September 30

On Monday, we went to my cousin's house to help him cut up some trees that had fallen in his back yard. With a medically complex child, his house was on the short list of priority homes to get the power back on as quickly as possible. It quickly became the hub for our entire family to check in, charge devices, connect to the internet, and make sure everyone else was alright.

Since my employer was still operating as normally as possible, I used the opportunity to connect with my team and get some work done. I would send some messages and emails, check in on the status of our projects, then go back out and cut some wood. It felt so nice to be properly productive again. I also received an email that they would be opening the office for employees and their families to get ice, use the kitchen equipment, or just hang out in the AC and watch Monday night football. I didn't take them up on the offer, but I did appreciate the willingness to help.

We also received an email from the school that they were cancelling class for the rest of the week through Friday, October 4th. As much as I hoped we would be back to normal before then, it was a very good idea. School districts have to operate according to the most restrictive conditions, and plenty of families were still very restricted with no timeline for when they would have power again. It's why they cancel school during snowy weather, even if the actual campus is completely clear. A lot of people don't seem to understand that, but it was the right call for them to free up the rest of the week for recovery.

As we were getting ready to leave, my cousin let me borrow the generator that he had initially borrowed for the medical equipment. Since they had regular electricity available again, he wouldn't need it. The generator was small, but it would be more than enough to keep our chest freezer running and charge flashlights and electronics for us at home. It was exactly what we needed to keep us functional until our power was restored.

After we got home, I started up the generator and plugged up our chest freezer with a 100' drop cord. Since I didn't need the entire length of the cable to reach from the freezer to the outside of our garage, I kept most of it coiled (remember this). While the chest freezer was cooling back down to an appropriate temperature, I got started cooking spaghetti over the fire.

Maybe an hour later, the generator kicked off. I checked the tank and it still had fuel. I cranked it up again and let it run for a while longer. Again, after a few minutes, the generator died. We did manage to run it frequently enough for long enough to keep the frozen food frozen, but I assumed that the generator just couldn't easily keep up with the power demands of the chest freezer. It was a labor, but it was worth the effort to make sure we didn't lose ALL our frozen food.

By Monday evening, we had our nightly Uno ritual down to a science. A folding table set up on the back porch was the perfect size for everyone to reach the draw and discard piles. The electric lantern hung from the ceiling fan provided more than enough light for our playing area. The breeze kept us much more comfortable than the increasingly stuff interior of the house. There really wasn't a better way to kill the last hour or so before bed.

We did discover at some point that while satellite recycling centers were still closed, the main landfill in Welford was open and accepting household trash and spoiled food. Although the food in the refrigerator was well past edible, we were leaving it in there mainly to keep it contained. We were still storing bags of trash in our shed to keep it isolated from the house and avoid the awful smell. With the landfill open, we would finally be able to clean out the refrigerator and get rid of the trash we had been accumulating.

"Due to lasting power outages, Spartanburg County Offices, Judicial Center, and Recycling Centers will be closed again tomorrow, Tuesday, October 1st. The landfill will remain open and is accepting household waste. Our Veterans' Affairs Office will also be open tomorrow, from 8:30 a.m. - 5:00 p.m."

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Tuesday, October 1

I wouldn't go so far as to say we were a well-oiled machine by Tuesday, but we had an effective system. The generator stayed outside the garage with a steady supply of gasoline. We set up a table outside with a surge protector for charging devices and Ryobi batteries, plus a coffee maker. I replaced the drop cord to the chest freezer with a shorter cable that seemed to have a thicker insulation and it seemed to work much more effectively. I deduced that the original cable must have been too long and not rated for enough voltage (amperage? wattage?) for what the chest freezer required.

As I was fully uncoiling the 100' cable to properly store it, I found that it didn't want to pull away easily. The cable seemed to almost be sticking to itself. As I peeled more layers away, I found that the cable had melted to itself on the inner layers. Apparently the resistance from sending enough electricity to power the chest freezer had generated enough heat to melt the cable along the inside of the coil. We could've burned the house down if it had caught fire. I was moderately perturbed, but what's done is done. The house didn't catch fire, but I did lose a drop cord. It could have been a much more costly mistake and nobody got hurt.

We decided to take a chance on Costco for our daily adventure. I tend to only get gas from Costco normally, so I thought we might be able to fall back on another old practice and get a little closer to normal. Costco was open, and the gas station was operational, but the line was 6 cars deep for every available pump. Furthermore, the left-most pumps were roped off exclusively for filling cans and portable containers. Although it did remove a lane for cars, I believe it was a much more optimal scenario. Several people were filling up multiple cans, and may or may not have needed fuel in their vehicle as well. This solution allowed vehicles to pass through and gave a dedicated area for the slower process of filling portable containers.

After getting gas at Costco, we spent a few more hours at my cousin's house using his internet and electricity, and a cutting up more of the fallen tree in his back yard. I felt like a mooch showing up for his utilities, so the least I could do was help him out with some manual labor while I was there. We finished the evening with more Uno and Majora's Mask. We had survived another day.

Wednesday, October 2

On Wednesday morning, with the knowledge that the landfill was open, we decided to clean out the refrigerator before it got too hot later in the day. I was devastated to see so much wasted food, but it was certainly better than letting it rot for a few days longer. The inside of the fridge was already room temperature, so it wasn't like the food was safe and waiting wouldn't make it any better. We loaded up the bags of food as well as all of the trash we had accumulated in the shed and made a trip up to the landfill. It was crowded, but the operation was surprisingly efficient. With multiple dumpsters available and a winding road from the entrance to the unloading area, the whole process went very quickly and we were able to dump the trash and roll out much faster than expected.

After getting rid of the trash, we made a trip into Spartanburg. To kill some time, we stopped by Lowe's. With power available in certain areas of town, Lowe's had all their Halloween and Christmas decorations up. It felt audacious for Lowe's to flex such a frivolous and unnecessary consumption of so much electricity, but it made the experience seem all the more normal. Even if we didn't have power at home, we could pretend that everything was standard operating procedure while we were in town at least.

When we left Lowe's, we went by Direct Tool Outlet to see if they had any Ryobi fans. I knew that Ryobi made fans that were compatible with the batteries I already had, and any airflow would be better than the stale heat of our bedroom at night. They were sold out of the misting bucket fans that I really wanted, but they still had some of the standard 7.5" fans in stock. I asked the cashier if customers seemed to like those fans, and he informed me that nobody ever returns them so they must. I picked one up without a moment's hesitation. It's probably the best $58.84 I've ever spent. I slept better that night than I had in nearly a week.

Thursday, October 3

Thursday started as more of the same. We did any cleanup and chores that we could in the morning before it got hot. That day, our focus was properly cleaning the refrigerator. Whenever the power did come back on, we would be able to put food directly back in after it got cool. We made the daily pilgrimmage to my cousin's house. After we got home, we had reheated spaghetti, garlic bread, and canned corn for dinner. Even if the primary goal was to just survive and get through the days, we were getting pretty good at it.

Around 8pm that evening, I had gone outside to the garage to look for something. While I was poking around in the dark with a flashlight, the overhead lights suddenly came back on and every electronic device in the house started making a cacophony of beeps and chimes. WE HAD ELECTRICITY! I turned on every light in the house just because we could. The thermostat read 79 in the bedroom; no wonder I couldn't sleep well without the fan. The internet came right back on, which wasn't the case for everyone. After about 12 hours shy of a full week, we finally had electricity again.

Aftermath

On Friday morning, I cooked breakfast inside like a normal person. It felt so weird, the previous day we were cooking on a griddle over a wood fire and assumed we would be for however long. To actually have running water and an electric range again felt like an absurd luxury.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized how fortunate we were. Even though we lost power for a few days while some around us never did, that's ALL we lost. Others lost power AND water. Some in the Asheville area lost entire homes. Many around us lost family and friends. We had a working vehicle and plenty of fuel. If at any point it got bad enough, we could've just left to find temporary lodging elsewhere. A lot of people didn't have that option available.

We didn't have any property damage. All we lost was a drop cord and the contents of our refrigerator. We had the tools and knowledge to stay safe and fed. If anything, we were actually better off after the hurricane. It was a refreshing break from technology and a sort of reset with our daily lives. We felt tremendously closer as a family. Many never get that opportunity.

On Saturday, we took the kids to the trampoline park. After putting up with some pretty difficult conditions for several days, we thought they needed the opportunity to have some fun. We also got an email that school was cancelled for Monday. Even though we had electricity again, a lot of homes around us still didn't. It was a good decision to give the rest of the weekend and one normal workday before evaluating whether school should begin again.

With the confidence that our power should be on mostly permanently and not turned back off for repairs, we went grocery shopping on Sunday. The Costco bill was a hefty one, but we had to replace the food we lost. I'm just glad we were able to buy more food and actually had something to eat during the storm and afterward.

Monday afternoon, we got the announcement that school would start back with a normal schedule on Tuesday. I assume they made a trial run with the busses to ensure that all roads were safe to travel and found everything acceptable. Although the break was nice, we were all ready to get back into a routine.

One Year Later

Here we are, over a year after the hurricane, and some areas are still recovering. Chimney Rock got basically destroyed. We haven't been back to our normal river tubing spot in Saluda, but I've heard the terrain there is basically unrecognizable. Several tubing businesses shut down because there was almost nothing left in some areas. Although power has long since been restored to homes, some powerlines are still drooping or held underneath trees and fallen limbs where the linemen simply haven't been able to get to them yet.

When we hear of hurricanes coming through, we take much more caution with it now, stocking up on bottled water and making sure our devices are charged at least. I haven't gone so far as to get solar panels and a battery backup yet, but I'm definitely considering it. Helene was the type of (hopefully) once in a lifetime storm that fundamentally changes you. We made it through, but I have much more respect for the power of nature now.