SEPTEMBER 24, 2025 – Only a month after the twentieth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, another anniversary comes due for a different catastrophic storm—it is the first anniversary after Hurricane Helene devastated the communities of the Appalachians.
On September 26, 2024, Hurricane Helene made landfall in southwestern Florida as a Category 4 hurricane with a peak sustained windspeed of 140 mph. After inundating Florida with storm surge, Helene swept north into Georgia and then the Carolinas, before stalling over Tennessee, Kentucky and Virginia and eventually dissipating.
However, it brought both tornado-strength winds and a deluge of rainfall that triggered flooding throughout the mountains and valleys of the Southeast. The hurricane was one of the deadliest and most destructive on record, causing more than 250 deaths and just under $80 billion in damage.
Helene cut a path over nine national forests from Florida to Kentucky: the Apalachicola, Cherokee, Chattahoochee-Oconee, Daniel Boone, Francis Marion & Sumter, George Washington & Jefferson, Nantahala, Osceola and Pisgah national forests. The forests and the USDA Forest Service employees that manage them were right in the path of destruction.
“Hard to wrap my mind around”
The devastation left by the flooding and winds was catastrophic. Alexandra Davison, a recreation specialist on the Pisgah National Forest in western North Carolina, was directly impacted.
“There was so much damage it was hard to wrap my mind around,” Davison remembered. “Roads were gone; creeks were running through where roads once were. Many landslides blocked access.”
On the Pisgah, as well as the other national forests in the Appalachian region, roads crisscross the mountains, many of them the only way for people to get to and from their homes. All of the flooding, downed trees, washed-out roads and landslides blocked them in, making evacuation and rescue extremely difficult.
That meant clearing those roads was a priority. Forest Service leaders quickly activated their incident management teams, trained to respond to all hazards, including hurricanes.
“On the Pisgah, our forest leadership not only called in the Southern Area Incident Management Blue Team, one of the standing wildfire response teams, but they also called in saw teams to clear the roads,” Davison said.
Of course, it wasn’t just downed trees. The deluge of water caused creeks and streams to burst their banks, bringing immense quantities of mud, sand and stone with them. After the waters receded, all of that sediment was left on the roads and trails. On the Sumter National Forest alone, more than 53 dump truck loads of sand and sediment had to be removed.
“We have many bridges to cross in terms of long-term recovery, but I’m proud of what we have accomplished so far,” Davison said. “It wouldn’t be possible without my talented coworkers. Looking at what we have done the past year, I feel positive about the future.”
By Alex Demas
Office of Communication