Helene Aftermath: At Least 162 Lives Lost

Six days after Helene embarked on its life-altering path across the Southeast, the region remains in the throes of disaster recovery.

At least 162 people have died as a result of the storm, and many others remain unaccounted for as communities across the region are crippled by catastrophic damage. Many people are without homes after Helene leveled neighborhoods and left survivors without necessities such as food, drinking water, cell phone service and electricity.

CNN  reports President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are expected to travel to the region Wednesday to see the scale of destruction and receive briefings on recovery operations.

Here’s what you need to know:

• Desperate search for the missing: Many families have yet to hear from loved ones who are unaccounted for, perhaps unable to reach them on blocked roads or call them due to cell service outages. Tennessee officials estimated 85 people were missing in the state Tuesday. And in Buncombe County, North Carolina, volunteers trekked through mud and debris to knock on hundreds of doors searching for residents.
• Pressing need for food and supplies: Hard-hit areas and trapped residents are struggling to access food, clean water and other critical supplies, prompting massive relief efforts from federal and local agencies and nonprofit groups. FEMA delivered a cargo plane full of food, water and emergency supplies to Asheville on Tuesday, after washed-out highways prevented supplies from arriving by truck. Dozens of trailers of food and water were also delivered to the state. World Central Kitchen, a nonprofit, said it has served 64,000 meals to storm victims in four states.
• More than 1 million without power: About 1.3 million homes and businesses remain without power from Florida to Virginia after Helene shredded energy infrastructure in its path, according to PowerOutage.us. That includes just under 500,000 in South Carolina and more than 350,000 in Georgia and North Carolina. In South Carolina and the mountains of North Carolina, about half of the outages will require “significant replacement of infrastructure,” utility Duke Energy said.
• Thousands of federal personnel mobilized: More than 3,500 federal personnel are aiding in recovery efforts, including 1,000 people from the FEMA and 1,250 people with urban search and rescue teams, according to a FEMA official.