NORTH FORT MYERS, Fla. — Cindy Miller wasn’t sure where to begin the cleanup this weekend at her home in Englewood, Florida. Hurricane Milton had drenched her home and dumped debris everywhere. Much of it was not even hers. A sofa, doors and shoes littered the backyard, along with detritus that remained from Hurricane Helene, the deadliest hurricane to hit the U.S. mainland in nearly two decades.
“You work all your life to live in paradise, and a hurricane comes and kicks you right in the butt,” said Miller, 70, who retired to Florida 15 years ago.
About 700 miles north, in the rugged, craggy version of paradise that is the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina, Drew Reisinger was still reeling from Helene, which had left him and his neighbors without running water for two weeks and counting. He had just poked a tiny hole into the bottom of a grocery bag full of water and was using it as a makeshift shower head.
Storm-weary residents are climbing out of the ruins left behind by two different hurricanes in two different locations. Hurricane Helene made landfall in Florida on Sept. 26, then plowed through the South, including North Carolina. Hurricane Milton made landfall Oct. 9 on the west coast of Florida.
Florida, a state where hurricanes are an enduring fact of life, avoided the worst-case scenario and is beginning to recover. Western North Carolina and its population center of Asheville, unaccustomed to frequent hurricanes, are still staggered by a storm that caught many off guard.
“Hurricanes no longer hit the coastline and then die,” said Beth Zimmerman, who led disaster operations for the Federal Emergency Management Agency during the Obama administration and is now a senior executive adviser with IEM, an emergency management consultant firm. “Everybody needs to be looking not to what they experienced in the past, but what is happening now in terms of hurricanes and extreme weather.”
The two hurricanes tell a tale of how storms, made more powerful by climate change, can devastate regions with distinct topography and varying levels of experience with hurricanes. They can leave behind discrepant kinds of damage and dictate different trajectories of recovery.
Zimmerman offered one example: Helene buckled and washed away many roads in Asheville and the surrounding rural mountain communities, initially isolating storm victims and slowing assistance. Milton, which made landfall late Wednesday, downed trees and power lines and scattered debris, but left most roads intact.
“While you have two hurricanes, they’re not the same thing — you’ve got two different types of events,” said Stephanie F. Pilkington, a professor of civil engineering, technology and construction management at the University of North Carolina Charlotte.
Western North Carolina was stunned by the catastrophic rainfall it received from Helene only days after a slow-moving rainstorm had passed through, drenching the ground and rivers. The fast-rising floods that resulted washed away entire neighborhoods and caught communities off guard, and the region’s recovery has been slowed by the daunting mountain terrain, downed trees and remote locations. Two weeks after the storm hit, thousands are still without power, water or cell service.
Gary Lackman, a professor of marine, earth and atmospheric sciences at North Carolina State University, said that, unlike in Florida, western North Carolina’s sloped terrain created distinct hazards, such as mud and debris flows and landslides.
“If the storms are stronger because of climate change, then they’re more likely to spread farther inland,” Lackman said. That, he said, will likely mean rebuilding with flood-resistant roads in the future.
While Florida’s building codes have long been able to account for the rounds of powerful storms that lash the state every hurricane season — they likely lessened the impact of Milton — Pilkington said Asheville and western North Carolina have not had to build with such a high risk in mind.
North Carolina’s department of transportation has identified more than 5,400 damaged road sites caused by Helene. Officials have no timeline yet for how long it will take to restore water in Asheville, where most people are still without it, or electricity to an estimated 40,000 customers in western North Carolina. Some schools are unsure when they will be able to resume classes in their buildings.
Authorities are also still searching for victims who were swept away. The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services said Saturday that it had verified 93 storm-related deaths. In total, the storm has killed at least 234 people across six states.
Still, people are doing their best to keep up their spirits and get by.
Ray and Kathy Soave, a retired couple who live in Woodfin, a small town just north of downtown Asheville, have been without running water since Sept. 27, when the worst part of Helene buffeted the region. They have figured out where to go for nonpotable water, but lacking clean water has stretched their resourcefulness.
“I found out that you can take a credible shower with a little over a liter of water,” Ray Soave, 70, said wryly. That is, he added, “if you don’t wash off too good.”
In Florida, where four major storms have barreled through in about two years, Milton arrived as residents were still clearing debris from Helene.
Milton pummeled coastal and island communities, but it spared the state’s most densely populated regions. It also spawned a tornado outbreak, including one that tore through a retirement community north of Fort Pierce, killing six people. In all, at least 14 deaths have been linked to Milton, but so far, none have been attributed to storm surge, suggesting that the massive evacuation was effective. More than 1 million customers were still without power as of Saturday.
Floridians are now returning to their homes, facing an uncertain recovery that has seen some grappling with damage from two storms in two weeks.
Kim Galloway, a 68-year-old retiree who lives in Englewood, saw her home flood, leaving behind sand and the smell of the sea.
Galloway recalled seeing photos of Helene’s destruction in North Carolina, which reminded her of her experience during Hurricane Sandy in 2012 in Philadelphia, a city that, in her opinion, was not prepared for the storm.
In contrast, she described Florida as more proactive with its preparations and alerts. “It’s almost overkill,” she said.
In the days before Milton arrived, officials issued a dire warning: Find a safe place inside or outside Florida, prompting one of the largest evacuations in the state’s history.
In Bradenton Beach, a small island community near Sarasota, officials believe all of the about 800 residents evacuated. In Siesta Key, near where the storm made landfall, sheriff’s deputies knocked on doors to make sure people left. The mass evacuation included many who had stayed in their homes for Helene.
Julie Lightner, 52, of South Venice, Florida, said that her family members had not initially evacuated for Helene but that, when the storm surge began to rise, they realized they had to go. The family members evacuated again for Milton, which flooded their home and tore off part of the roof.
The forecast of potential storm surge, she said, had worried her the most.
“If the water rose that high,” she said, “it would have filled our home.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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