How Can We Help?
Brandi Wilson lives in Pensacola, NC, a town of about 2,000 in Yancey County, 14 miles up Mount Mitchell from Burnsville, the county seat. When we interviewed Brandi, it was six weeks after the flood. We were alerted to Brandi’s story by Chipper Jones, a tree farmer who lives nearby.
This is Brandi’s story
“We woke up that Friday morning (Sept. 27) and it was raining harder than I’ve seen it. Looked outside down at the river - we live up on a hill - and the river was not where it was supposed to be. It was way out of its banks. Our house is not directly beside the river. Those houses were all gone.
“When it finally stopped raining, we went outside and were shocked. There were no roads left. The river had washed them away, or they were under the mudslides. We realized we couldn’t go anywhere. We had no way to communicate with the outside world. All we had were CB radios. My husband is an avid bear hunter, so he had an ATV and a CB radio. There’s a lot of construction going on up here, and he and some of our neighbors were able to locate some construction vehicles, got them going and started clearing the roads the best they could.
“He got a huge track hoe and was able to go down and actually reroute the river so we could get to the area where the road had been, and after about three days they’d cleared basically a foot path to get down to the next little village, where there were some guys down there doing the same thing. By about Wednesday - five days after the flood - we had a path all the way down to Burnsville, about 14 miles down the mountain.”
Neighbors in nearby towns were alarmed
By this time, as Chipper Jones told us, there were a lot of people very anxious to know if Brandi and her neighbors were all right. “We knew nothing,” Chipper said. “We didn’t know if they were alive or dead.”
The breakthrough on the communications front happened that Wednesday as well, when a helicopter delivered to the local fire department a StarLink, giving them the ability to communicate with the outside world ”That was a game changer,” she said.
“I’ll tell you a cheer went up when we heard she and her neighbors were ok,” Chipper said.
By mid-November, routines were slowly returning, but the challenges are huge.
“It looks terrible up here,” she said. “The roads we’re driving on look like creek beds. There are huge piles of dead trees everywhere. We went five-and-a-half weeks without power, so getting power back has been a God send, but most folks still don’t have internet. We got a huge donation of generators, as well as gas and diesel fuel, which will be much needed once winter comes on. Everyone had plenty of firewood, but it all washed away, so one of the main volunteer projects is cutting and re-stacking firewood for people.
“A lot of heart. And a lot of hard work.”
Brandi Wilson, with husband Cameron and son Henry
“One of the most amazing things from that Friday was to see a mobile home floating down the river like a boat. There was a couple inside and we later heard that the house broke in half, the couple was thrown out and the woman grabbed hold of a wire fence. The husband grabbed hold of her, then grabbed the fence and they were able to pull themselves out of the river. Somehow, they survived. Of course we didn’t find that out for about a week. The husband was a member of the volunteer fire department, and the day after they were rescued he was back at work, helping people. That’s the thing I’d say, this has been a lot of heart, and a lot of hard work. And what’s really amazing, most of the work has been done by volunteers. People just helping because they can. I’ll tell you, this has really strengthened my faith.”
Brandi added: “There are a lot of volunteer groups who are doing amazing work. I’ve definitely seen a lot of evidence that Samaritan’s Purse is really making a difference.”
Samaritan’s Purse www.samaritanspurse.org/disaster/hurricane-helene
The international headquarters of Samaritan’s Purse is in Boone, NC, the county seat of Watauga County, NC, and one of the hardest hit areas of the region. The non-profit is supporting relief efforts across Western North Carolina and Eastern Tennessee, including Buncombe County, NC, home to Asheville. Immediately after the flood, Samaritan’s Purse provided air-relief and rescue support for people in areas with roads washed away, and a 20-bed emergency field hospital in Avery County. Now, Samaritan’s Purse is providing ongoing relief for the region. If you want to help the region where Brandi lives, you can make a donation to Samaritan’s Purse.
Thank you
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