Home Care In Milton, NC

Our fellow citizens should not go without water, food, electricity or cell service day after day. We must expect more from our government and more for our neighbors.

USA TODAY

In western North Carolina, thousands of Americans continue to suffer in the wake of Hurricane Helene. Nearly two weeks after the storm hit, many residents of Asheville and surrounding areas are without water, electricity and other vital resources.

Helene caused more damage, much farther inland, than predicted. Families living in the mountains don't expect the remnants of a hurricane to threaten their lives and destroy their homes.

But in 2024, thousands of Americans should not go without basic necessities day after day.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) exists to help in such emergencies. While there's been much political back-and-forth about the agency's effectiveness in the wake of Helene, and not a small amount of misinformation, it is reasonable for citizens to question how well their government is delivering on its promises − just as they did after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and after other natural disasters before and since.

North Carolina still lacking water and electricity

On Sunday, Biden-Harris administration officials said they were "sparing no resource" to help those affected by the storm. A week ago, they said they were leading "a robust Federal response to help impacted communities in the wake of Hurricane Helene."

Yet, families are still transporting clean water in 5-gallon containers and milk jugs 13 days after the storm came ashore in Florida.

By Tuesday evening in North Carolina, more than 110,000 customers were still without electricity. Roads remain impassable in some areas. Mules are carrying essentials like food, water and insulin to those in need. As time passes, the risk of illness grows.

Opinion:Helene devastated my NC community. What I saw next helped me survive.

On Sunday, House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., described FEMA's response as a "massive failure." Former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, said FEMA's failures are a "slap in the face" to Americans in need.

Rep. Cory Mills, R-Fla., has been on the ground in North Carolina and has delivered supplies, such as insulin and oxygen. Last week, Mills, an Army veteran, told Fox News that the federal government has "failed to act."

In their defense, FEMA administrators say they have provided more than $137 million in assistance to six states, including about 15 million meals, 14 million liters of water and 157 generators as of Sunday.

But as Hurricane Milton bears down on Florida, and with the massive needs that remain in North Carolina, it's fair to ask whether FEMA is up to the job of easing the suffering of millions of Americans.

Citizens step up to help their neighbors

FEMA's weaknesses, both historical and current, show why private aid and "everyday" citizens are often more effective in crisis than the federal government. Citizens are local, motivated and unhindered by layers of bureaucracy.

Yet, while it's inspiring to see helicopter pilots rescue desperate survivors in the North Carolina mountains before a federal agency reaches them, it's also evidence that FEMA must do better.

Opinion:I worried my friends in NC wouldn't survive Helene. They told me how they did.

Our fellow citizens should not go without water, food, electricity or cell service day after day. We must expect more from our government and more for our neighbors.

We must investigate FEMA's response to Americans in crisis.

Nicole Russell is an opinion columnist with USA TODAY. She lives in Texas with her four kids. Sign up for her newsletter, The Right Track, and get it delivered to your inbox.

After Hurricane Helene left Dan Hadley and Diane deGrasse with no power or water at their home in Black Mountain, N.C., an old friend from church offered them her home in Venice, Fla. She was going to be away, but at least the couple could get a respite from the tough post-storm conditions.

Mr. Hadley, 87, drove 14 hours over two days to get to Venice. “We said, ‘Hey, let’s head to sunny Florida!” he said.

Then, Hurricane Milton formed in the Gulf of Mexico.

“This dumb luck,” Mr. Hadley said by phone as rains and winds gusted outside.

The couple once again found themselves with no running water — local officials shut it off ahead of the storm — but they still had power late Wednesday afternoon. They had lifted books and other items off the floor, expecting a foot or two of storm surge, though Mr. Hadley said the latest forecast showing a slightly weaker storm had reassured him a bit.

Speaking from her second home in Cape Cod, Mass., Linda Underwood said she could not believe she had inadvertently put her friends in Milton’s path.

“I did it out of the goodness of my heart,” she said. “Now they’re sitting quite near the shores of Venice, Florida.”

The Venice house is in an evacuation zone, Mr. Hadley said — half a mile from the water — but “we just have no place to go.”

Many Floridians have ties to North Carolina. Terry Neal, who is retired, splits his time between Tampa, Fla., and Hendersonville, N.C. He was in North Carolina for Helene and his home there still has no power. He was anxiously waiting to see what Milton might do to his Tampa home.

“I lived in Florida for 24 years, and I’ve seen hurricanes come through before, but nothing like these past two weeks,” Mr. Neal said. “I just can’t believe it.”

His Tampa home is near a river. He said in an interview on Tuesday that he worried the house would flood and he might lose meaningful belongings, such as his pets’ ashes. Before he leaves each year for North Carolina, he said, “I say to them, ‘You’re protecting our home.’”

But mostly, Mr. Neal said, “I worry about the living” — his friends and neighbors in Tampa who might soon face conditions similar to the one his friends and neighbors in North Carolina are weathering.

Mr. Hadley said that when he retired to the Asheville, N.C., area, he considered it a climate haven.

“There was no way of anticipating that we’d get soaked with rain before Helene was even a storm,” he said.

Now, awaiting Milton, he and his wife have stocks of food, water and liquor, he said. Ms. deGrasse, he added, “has been making really quite excellent peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.”

Florida hospitals preparing for Hurricane Milton to make landfall

Florida hospitals are bracing for Hurricane Milton and an influx of patients after the storm hits.

Milton's center could come come ashore Wednesday night, putting the entire Tampa Bay region and points south at grave risk.

In Tampa Bay, Tampa General Hospital is built on an island and at sea level, which could cause devastating impacts. As a result, an AquaFence flood protection wall is being built higher around the hospital.

Alan Foster, director of emergency preparedness at UNC Health Rex in Raleigh, said he knows all too well how to prepare for a storm in the Triangle.

"Hospitals, especially those on the coast, have existing plans to prepare for these events," Foster said. "Locally we are prepared to have things stocked and have all sorts of redundancies, utilities, supplies, etc., for a minimum of 96 hours."

Foster said an extra stock of water, generators, food, linens and internet should be at the ready in areas Milton will hit.

"As far as patient load, especially on the coast, they may discharge some folks to get them out of the hospital and out of harm's way," Foster said.

Foster said UNC Health Rex will ensure adequate staffing is in place before a natural disaster.

"We have had staff that have come in and stayed just the night before their shift or past their shift," Foster said. "Being self sustaining for a time is critical."

Mary Martin, chief operating officer with Duke University Hospital, explained a tool called Care Hub is used during emergencies, especially to coordinate bringing in patients from other hospitals.

"It is not uncommon for us to get sick patients from all over the southeast, we have had some come from Florida," Martin said. "Care Hub is a centralized command center for all things capacity ... it's the air traffic control for the health system."

Care Hub shows how many beds are available at hospitals and information about staffing and transport teams.

Last month, Duke took in patients from western N.C. when Helene hit. It is too soon to know if North Carolina hospitals will accept patients from Florida.

"We used it during Helene when reports of Mission Hospital (in Asheville) needed to evacuate 250 patients statewide," Martin said. "We were able to indicate through our three hospitals how many [patients] we would be able to take."

Care Hub also prioritizes patient transfers.

"It has allowed us to make in-the-moment decisions and say yes," Martin said. "It's very handy and vital in emergent situations.

ASHEVILLE, N.C. (WTVD) -- As Hurricane Milton continues churning towards Florida, ABC11 spoke with federal officials about what that might mean for the ongoing disaster response in western North Carolina.

Communities across the mountains continue to rely on donations and federal support as they rebuild in the wake of Hurricane Helene.

"I'm not sure what the future holds. I mean, it's only been a week and it's still kind of too early to tell," Adam Charnack, co-founder of Hi-Wire Brewing, said.

Hi-Wire's three locations were staples in Asheville before they expanded into the Triangle with their Durham taproom in 2018. Helene gutted the brewery's operation in the mountains, destroying their River Arts District beer garden and 80% of their beer.

"Corporate offices were there, the building was kind of like the heart of the company, basically. I mean, we had so many things in that building. It was all washed away," Charnack said.

Hi-Wire has already applied for help from FEMA. Charnack said they're very grateful for the community's support in the last 10 days but he knows this level of attention may not last, especially with Category 5 Milton powering towards the Florida coast.

"That's truly I think where the government can help," he said. "Donations are coming in fast. They're coming in strong now. But we we know they're going to they're going to peter off. I mean, they're not going to last forever."

But, FEMA officials are adamant -- they're in North Carolina to stay.

"This is a very robust response here in North Carolina, and that's not going to change," FEMA spokesperson John Mills said.

Mills is part of FEMA's Incident Management Assistance Team. He states that the arrival of Hurricane Milton will not affect the amount of resources the agency allocates to Western North Carolina.

"We already had hundreds and hundreds of FEMA personnel in Florida because of previous hurricanes, including Helene," Mills said. "And now we're bringing in more resources there. But that is not doing anything to change the response here in North Carolina."

FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell is scheduled to address the media at 8:30 on Tuesday morning about "rumors and false information being spread ahead of Milton".

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The Carolina Hurricanes and Tampa Bay Lightning will open the 2024-25 NHL hockey season Friday at the Lenovo Center. That much we know.

And beyond that? Who can say?

The Hurricanes and Lightning are scheduled to play again Saturday night at Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida. But with Hurricane Milton set to slam into western Florida, with evacuation orders in place, there is much uncertainty about such things as hockey games.

The Lightning left Florida on Monday to come to the Triangle, canceling a final preseason game against Nashville. The team is staying in Chapel Hill after some hastily made reservations and practiced Tuesday at Invisalign Arena in Morrisville.

The players were allowed to bring their families and pets with them to North Carolina, Lightning general manager Julien BriseBois said Tuesday. All of the staffers also made the extended trip, he said.

For now, no one can say if the game Saturday in Tampa can or will be played. Or what will happen if it’s not played..

“This is not ideal,” BriseBois said.

N.C. State has a football game against Syracuse on Saturday night at Carter-Finley Stadium, which could create logistical problems with holding a game at the Lenovo Center.

Playing Sunday at Lenovo Center might be an option. But BriseBois noted that should Hurricane Milton preclude a return to Florida because of extensive storm damage, the team likely would not be in the proper mindset to play Sunday.

“It’s unfortunate what’s going on, right, but what I see out of the guys is it’s a burden being disrupted in what we’re doing but we have the ability to bring our families and loved ones and pets with us,” Tampa Bay coach Jon Cooper said Tuesday. “There is a bigger picture, as I told our guys. We got to get away. There are a lot of people at home who haven’t been able to get away, so a lot of our thoughts are that hopefully everybody is going to be OK and what can we do when we get back to help everybody out.”

For now, so much remains in flux.

“I’ve heard they might not be going back after our game, so whether that means we’ll be playing here, I’m not quite sure how it will unfold,” Canes captain Jordan Staal said Tuesday. “It’s part of the gig when things like this happen, and you battle through big things and small things and how schedules work. We’ll play the game (Friday) and figure it out as we go.

“It’s not just our team but their team, too. Obviously they’re displaced from their homes and going through a lot more stuff than we are.”

Staal noted his parents had a Florida vacation home near Naples, saying he was “praying for everyone that it doesn’t look as bad as it does right now.”

First there was Hurricane Helene, which worked its way north and into Western North Carolina, leaving behind much destruction and loss of life. Now, Hurricane Milton, which rapidly became a Category 5 storm in the Gulf of Mexico and was growing in intensity at an explosive rate.

The storm was expected to make landfall on Florida’s Gulf Coast on Wednesday, the projected path taking it near Tampa, an area that has not had a direct hit from a major hurricane since 1921.

“At the end of the day as long as your family is safe that’s the most important thing,” Tampa Bay forward Luke Glendening said Tuesday.

The Lightning took the ice at noon for its practice. Missing was forward Jake Guentzel, who played for the Canes last season before being traded to Tampa Bay and then signed, but Cooper said he expected Guentzel to be ready for the opener.

The Hurricanes did not practice Tuesday but held team meetings at Invisalign.

“We planned it this way,” Canes coach Rod Brind’Amour said Tuesday. “Obviously you don’t want to practice four days in a row going into a game. We’ll get in a couple of practices, then drop the puck.

“I think everybody has been ready and itching for a while to play a real game, so I think we’ll be ready to roll.”

Many NHL teams will have played their season openers before Friday, leaving the Canes somewhat antsy about getting on the ice, getting started.

The Canes took a trip Monday to Fort Liberty in Fayetteville. Later Monday, a 25-man roster for opening day was turned into the league.

“For me, going there was important just to show our appreciation for what those guys do for us,” Brind’Amour said. “It’s very understated, in my opinion. It’s nice to kind of be in their area and hang out with those guys a little bit. To get our guys around that environment is always good.”

This story was originally published October 8, 2024, 1:27 PM.

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In more than 40 years at The N&O, Chip Alexander has covered the N.C. State, UNC, Duke and East Carolina beats, and now is in his 15th season on the Carolina Hurricanes beat. Alexander, who has won numerous writing awards at the state and national level, covered the Hurricanes’ move to North Carolina in 1997 and was a part of The N&O’s coverage of the Canes’ 2006 Stanley Cup run.