Currently, more than 160 people are known to have died as a result of Hurricane Helene, one of the deadliest storms to hit the United States in recent memory.
Hundreds more remain missing after Helene devastated the southeastern states, causing floods, devastating communities and cutting power.
Search and rescue efforts continued and aid deliveries were made by plane and mule. The US government said clarification efforts could take years.
President Joe Biden is expected to visit hard-hit North Carolina on Wednesday, while Vice President Kamala Harris will travel to neighboring Georgia.
Both happen to be key swing states in November’s presidential election — and the storm has become politics after Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump made a private trip to Georgia earlier this week.
Helene hit the United States on Thursday as a Category 4 storm – the strongest on record to hit Florida’s Big Bend – before tearing through neighboring states and downgrading to a tropical storm.
The scale of the rain clouds was unusual and the storm lasted for a relatively long time. Saturated soil from previous rains is also an aggravating factor.
CBS News, the BBC’s US partner, reported 162 deaths, recorded across six states: North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee and Virginia.
The toll surpasses that of Hurricane Ian, which in September 2022 became one of the deadliest storms of the 21st century – claiming at least 156 lives.
According to CBS, nearly half of the deaths caused by Helene were in North Carolina alone, where rainfall lasted for six months.
Mountainous areas of the state received particularly heavy rain – typical during storm conditions – which caused homes and bridges to be washed away.
An emergency official in Buncombe County – which includes the hard-hit city of Asheville – said the state had experienced “biblical devastation”.
A volunteer involved in the relief effort told the BBC on Tuesday that they know someone who “lost everything” in Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and moved to Asheville, only to be left devastated nearly two decades later. there.
“It looks like she’s been wiped out again,” the volunteer said. “She had no water, no gas. The food in her refrigerator has rotted.”
Extreme weather also forced the closure of mines in Spruce Pine, a small town that is home to the world’s largest source of high-purity quartz.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said rebuilding efforts could take years. Biden has allowed survivors to apply for federal aid money by issuing disaster declarations in various states.
On Monday, Biden referenced reports that as many as 600 people were missing. “God willing, they are alive,” he said. “But there was no way to contact them again because there was no cell phone coverage.”
More than a million people in several affected states were also without power Wednesday morning, according to the monitoring website Poweroutage.us.
Initial analysis of the storm suggested that human-caused climate change played a significant role in the amount of rain that fell.
After Helene made landfall late Thursday, record flood peaks were measured in at least seven locations in North Carolina and Tennessee.
In parts of western North Carolina, records that had stood since the “Great Flood” of July 1916 were broken.
The Atlantic hurricane season continues until the end of November. The waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean are currently experiencing above-average temperatures, meaning there is a possibility that stronger storms will develop.
