Quote :

"Also, conservatives are sharing misinformation about how bad (the death toll) and other lies in order to score points against the current administration."

when I went to Twitter, 90% of the top posts were trying to politicize it

I don't understand why Elon is riding Trump's coattails so much (ok I know coattails isn't the right term here, but I didn't want to say nuts )

is it because he's scared of being taxed on his income I guess?

I've seen so much right-wing propaganda, and I'm impressionable enough that I'm kind of starting to question both sides LOL the main thing I don't understand is why people are proud to cast their vote for Trump, when the rest of the world can clearly see what a maniac he is. I mean cast your vote for whoever you want, but why would you be proud of that

10/6/2024 6:34:14 PM

Because Trump is thoroughly compromised and the rich see this as their opportunity to buy control of the United States.

10/6/2024 9:39:21 PM

https://youtu.be/MYdC-6nShdc?si=wsZGGkaVxhAokOdO

Not Asheville, but a great account of devastation in Chimney Rock.

10/6/2024 10:35:41 PM

Quote :

"misinformation about how bad (the death toll) and other lies"

Those 500-1,000+ numbers are definitely BS but I think it’s still going to increase substantially…wouldn’t be surprised if there will be at least 200-300 in NC

[Edited on October 7, 2024 at 9:14 AM. Reason : .]

10/7/2024 9:08:28 AM

According to facebook videos, you can't even go west of Charlotte without being knocked out by the stench of millions of corpses

10/7/2024 1:10:02 PM

This is probably how the walking dead started

10/7/2024 1:13:36 PM

Walter my guess is similar -- 200 or 300

I've seen braindead Alex Jones cultists say 20,000 and that the government is bulldozing them into the earth and lying about it

10/7/2024 2:47:45 PM

Is this a fun game to those people, or are do they really believe this stuff? It's concerning.

10/7/2024 3:02:57 PM

It's weird psychology stuff.

I think for a lot of them, it makes them feel smart and superior, since they believe they're privy to information that most people don't know/believe.

10/7/2024 3:06:53 PM

You guys didn’t hear? Bodies are washing all the way down to Jordan Lake. You just haven’t heard about it because the government is keeping it under wraps.

10/7/2024 3:51:12 PM

Yeah i can't read Facebook because all the fucking posts are about how FEMA is fucking everything up and the government isn't doing a single thing!!! I guess all those big ass military helicopters that started flying by the house on last saturday were all just privately owned. Same thing with the convoys of DOT trucks that were going down 40.

10/7/2024 3:51:22 PM

Hell hath no fury like Justins scorn

10/7/2024 4:18:17 PM

Helene was a false flag hurricane!





Or something like that.

10/7/2024 4:21:28 PM

Yes, they faked a hurricane to raze towns for lithium mines. Despite the fact the lithium in NC is east of the affected areas

10/7/2024 5:03:30 PM

Didn't you read about the hundreds of bodies dissolved and absorbed by the lithium? Carbon from human bone marrow has been shown to increase EV range by up to 3 miles. Those hundreds of human bodies will result in billions of dollars going to the US EV industry over time.

10/7/2024 5:12:27 PM

They didn't fake the hurricane, they steered it where they wanted it go to with their weather machines, obviously

10/7/2024 6:22:32 PM

Jewish weather manipulation machines.

10/7/2024 6:43:24 PM

That’s crazy talk, there’s no weather machines. They just shot liquid nitrogen into the storm, which they knew from prior experience changes the direction west, so that it would hit the lithium deposits

10/7/2024 7:10:32 PM

god damn, are we all really fucked that soon?

I have a full-on phobia for natural disasters, they're the only thing I'm really scared of. I think bc of the big hurricanes in eastern NC (probably throughout part of the state otherwise, IDR for sure) that we had way back when (late 90s)

I know how dumb it sounds, but I thought the massive disasters were going to start in like 2050 and I'd prob be dead by then or something lol RIP

thanks for listening, and stay tuned for less

10/8/2024 3:26:19 PM

Quote :

"they're the only thing I'm really scared of."

strike that, I'm scared as shit of airplanes

that's like a combination of potential natural disaster, complete lack of control, and basically putting yourself at the mercy of the pilot

TWW is a blog

10/8/2024 3:33:34 PM

I rode the storm out in Asheville because of a poorly timed vacation.
It took 20 hours to drive home between friday afternoon and Saturday because there were no roads out. Everything was under water.
No power, no water, no cell, and destroyed roads.

Sunday I was loading trucks for Operation Airdrop.
Monday I was driving convoys of goods to a state run supply depot south of Asheville.

Thursday through Sunday I was on the ground in small towns around Asheville (Candler, Fairview, Gerton, Swannanoa) with a team of 19 guys setting up donation and supply points, organizing helicopter landing zones, coordinating with FD and EMS on areas that needed further assistance, and working with contacts in Charlotte at Operation Airdrop on setting up convoys up to supply points.
The church we were operating out of was serving over 2,000 meals a day from the supplies being trucked in.

FEMA didn't do shit. Every time I ran into a Fema person or a county director operating with Fema, it was a proverbial road block. They would come in, take control, and then wait for permission on every step, drastically reducing the effectiveness of any operation that was occurring before they got there.
The National Guard was helpful, but many were pissed that their time was being wasted and they were being told to do anything useful. The Chinooks were doing regular drops, but that was minimal compared to the hundreds of private pilots. The Engineering crews were cleaning up roads and the rivers. The rest were babysitting water trucks, or endlessly driving supplies back and forth only be told to go back to where they started without ever unloading.

The destruction is unlike anything I have ever seen before, and many places look like 3rd world countries.
This hit everyone, from people rolling up in 30 year old beater truck to the nurse who pulled up in her Audi S5. They all needed food and water.
I had people in tears because we were able to provide them socks and a pillow.
There is no power (linemen say they have about 80% of the main legs completed as of sunday, but Duke is going to repair everything themselves off the main lines), no water (we have been told 2-3 weeks for the main lines, and maybe 6 months for everything to be completed), minimal phones (T-mobile worked first and was spotty, but Verison was still out when I left), and you can't do laundry or even change clothes if everything washed away.

The little area my group was operating in had a reported 87 fatalities so far, and there are still over 1,000 people missing in the storm area. The FD had us using our contacts to see if we could find additional body bags to be brought in. They had resorted to contractor trash bags by the time we got there.

There may be a time for politics soon, but it isn't yet. Blaming parties means you are just (I self redacted this rant). The bureaucracy that slowed and actively hampered the response is a problem. Full stop.

10/9/2024 9:37:45 PM

^I feel like we can talk politics now.

I'll start...why did the Charlotte Observer say "shame on donald trump"?

10/9/2024 10:00:45 PM

I’m trying to parse your words, but can you provide a little more detail what exactly you mean by

Quote :

"The little area my group was operating in had a reported 87 fatalities so far,"

The total official NC confirmed death toll from the storm is still only sitting at like 117. I know there is a process where I don’t think they add to that until families have been notified and such, and we all expect that number to grow significantly as time goes on, but for you to say your little area had almost double the confirmed deaths is a little striking. So are these deaths that have been submitted to the state medical examiner for confirmation to add to the toll, or stuff you heard second hand? Just curious. Also what exactly was your little area?

[Edited on October 9, 2024 at 10:16 PM. Reason : Updated official number from 88 after looking some more ]


Did just see this in a news article, so maybe it is just those types of delays I mentioned

Quote :

"The state count is delayed as some local sheriff’s offices are reporting search and rescue efforts before being additionally confirmed at the state level. For example, the Buncombe County Sheriff's Office confirmed 72 fatalities in the county as of Oct. 3. In the official state numbers at 4 p.m., Oct. 9, there were 41 fatalities confirmed in the county."

[Edited on October 9, 2024 at 10:24 PM. Reason : $$$]

10/9/2024 10:12:10 PM

I rode the storm out at my home near Bent Creek (South Asheville, prob ~5-8 miles west of the most ravaged areas) with my 3 year old and 8 month pregnant wife. I saw someone online call the sound of snapping trees “The Knuckles of God” and I thought that was pretty apt. I had 3 trees uproot, two of which were 30+” diameter, and then had the tops snap out of another 5-6 trees. Somehow there was no injuries or major damage to property on my street, yet every one of the biggest trees fell directly across the driveway. I remember telling my neighbor that I share the drive with “Jesus this is gonna take me three days to cut a path out .” Looking back that was a pretty charitable estimate. Fortunately, just as I was gassing my saw up, here come 3 of my neighbors with chainsaws and another walking a mini-excavator down the driveway. That crew had us a path out in about an hour!

We hung around, helping neighbors and improving our path down the driveway. By Monday morning we felt like we had pretty good confirmation 26 south was open, my 3 year old had gone feral and my wife preferred being close to a functioning hospital, so we split to stay with family in Charlotte. I’ve returned 3 times over the past 1.5 weeks with supplies for neighbors, check on the house, and keep improving access to my street.

I don’t have any special insights, as I barely left the neighborhood, except to drive the Brevard Rd corridor in search of phone service on a couple occasions. I didn’t see RAD or Biltmore village until yesterday. It was truly an unimaginable amount of water flowing through those areas. I hardly have a full understanding of the damage or response.

So I’m open to discussion of how the response went, but it needs to be objective.

Saturday morning (9/28) to Monday morning (9/30) Chinooks we’re doing laps over my house. I have no idea what they were doing or where they were headed but it was multiple helos running back forth for hours every day. I saw almost no private helos during this time. Even later in the week I’d say I saw 4 military helos for every private helo. That’s not me being dismissive of the private pilots coming to help, I think it has to do with where I was located. I am 5-10 miles north of AVL airport where the military was staged and over my house was obviously an artery for their flight paths. If you were located on the East side of town I imagine people saw more private helos because they were staging at Hickory’s airport.

FEMA is absolutely doing things. They coordinated multiple out-of-state swift water rescue teams to be in the area before Helene even arrived and they were already rescuing people in the pre-event. They coordinated the professional SAR teams that were in The area. The state had distribution points for water and food and FEMA has already delivered 6 million liters of water and 4 million individual meals to those distribution points. I can’t describe how critical that operation is. One of the reasons I kept the family in the neighborhood as much as possible is every time we left I saw people acting in ways that unnerved me. Driving erratically, arguing at gas pumps that didn’t even have gas, the looks on their faces standing in the massive line at the grocery. That food and water distribution kept Brevard rd from becoming a riot, no doubt in my mind. FEMA set Mission hospital up with its sterile water supply (my understanding) and helped facilitate the emergency well drilling there. They also direct deposited $750 in my bank account 4 days after I applied for it.

The NCDOT actually “deputized” that crew of neighbors that cleared my driveway. They were extended DOT insurance coverage as a contractor and were being sent to clear various roads by a NCDOT dispatcher.i thought that was a pretty efficient use of volunteers.

Emergency management officials have ALWAYS been able to keep civilians out of certain areas during a state of emergency. Consider the possibility that the officials that slowing people down might have had a legitimate reason to get permission before sending them into some area.

Out of state power crews are absolutely turning power on to houses at the end of the line. I am the absolute end of my distribution line. Crews from Detroit and Nova Scotia worked together to restore power to my neighborhood this past Tuesday. Verizon has worked in my neighborhood since Wednesday (10/2)

I felt like the response was pretty solid where I was given the circumstances, but I do wonder about the response way out in the Hollers. The nature of those areas just make it extremely complicated and is probably outside of the experience of many emergency personnel from outside the area. If there is any criticism of the response I imagine it will be related to these areas. Living way out in a holler is a two-sided coin. People move out there so they don’t have neighbors and to be left alone. They all know that if they have an emergency (heart attack, fall off the ATV, whatever) it’s going to take a minute for help to arrive. I’m not judging their choice to live in those areas, I respect it and am jealous of their properties in a lot of ways.

10/10/2024 9:14:19 AM

Quote :

"Those 500-1,000+ numbers are definitely BS but I think it’s still going to increase substantially…wouldn’t be surprised if there will be at least 200-300 in NC"

I'd rethink that. I suspect that 500, minimum, is a reasonable estimate. Some counties are requesting a *lot* of body bags, and I'm not entirely sure authorities have even reached all the affected areas yet, even now. But it ain't gonna be 20k, either

10/10/2024 9:21:24 AM

Quote :

""The little area my group was operating in had a reported 87 fatalities so far" The total official NC confirmed death toll from the storm is still only sitting at like 117. I know there is a process where I don’t think they add to that until families have been notified and such, and we all expect that number to grow significantly as time goes on, but for you to say your little area had almost double the confirmed deaths is a little striking. So are these deaths that have been submitted to the state medical examiner for confirmation to add to the toll, or stuff you heard second hand? Just curious. Also what exactly was your little area?"

My information came from first responders at the Fairvew FD. Same thing as the request for more body bags.
They were using thermal drones to find deceased, by looking for clusters of animals.....
I'm sure those numbers aren't counted yet.

When I tried to coordinate from a middle school with a county manager (7 truck loads of goods for delivery) she told me to email the county and they would get back to me.
The PTA had set up a distribution point, and the county manager said they could only be on school grounds from noon to 4pm, even though we had people set up from 10-6.

I'm separating the rescue and recovery groups that FEMA may have sent, to the bureaucrat types that showed up and but the brakes on everything.
Multiple people were stopped and turned away from completing donations, and even FD and EMS types were pissed of that once the FEMA people got to town they drastically slowed permissions for the work they were doing.

Candler, Fairview, Swannanoa were all areas we were operating out of. My group still has people in Swannanoa working.

10/10/2024 10:18:21 AM

Yeah, sounds like Fairview was really fucking bad. Article out today about one guy that lost 11 family members there in a mudslide

10/10/2024 10:38:08 AM

10/13/2024 12:33:14 PM

^insane

I’m not seeing the understanding in the media or amongst the public that this was likely a 10,000+ yr flood event. Only a 0.01% probability this event could happen in any given year (probably even less), a total freak storm. I will be interested to see experts weigh in on this after they get all the data back. It’s so outrageously expensive to regulate a floodplain this large or harden infrastructure against an upper tail event like this. WNC has a hard enough time getting infrastructure to function in the best of times.

Now that we are getting Media reports of threats against FEMA workers in Rutherford and Ashe county I feel like I can include an anecdote about one of my own friends that volunteered as a field nurse with a FEMA Incident Management Team in Yancey County. I hesitated to include it here thinking it might just be a one-off, and not representative, but it seems like it might have been more common than I thought. This person sympathized with the locals as they had only received help from the local Fire Department for 3-4 days. That’s unacceptable and I think if we ever get a full review of the response it will show it just wasn’t good enough in some of the rural areas. So trust between FEMA and the locals was not great from the get go. Apparently some militia bros (like literally in matching fatigues) were in the area from somewhere down in the piedmont and were also helping out with all kinds of tasks. The militia bros were further increasing the trust gap by repeating all the stupid ass disinformation that we have all seen. The FEMA team was repeatedly bullied and threatened by these folks, such that two Yancey County Deputies had to be tasked as a protection detail and the team dropped its door-to-door efforts and tried to just operate a field hospital in a local church parking lot. The situation culminated in a telephoned in threat that “snipers” were watching the team at the field hospital location and that is when the team leader made the decision to move out of the area to a bigger and more established staging area.


It starts to make sense why the national guard was having to babysit water tankers and why emergency workers were so wigged out by people just rolling up on them with aid.

10/14/2024 9:51:56 AM

I know there are a lot of good people there who were severely impacted, but I'm getting pretty cynical about their continued ignorance. You have to be willing to have some amount of self-sufficiency and patience with disaster response if you live out there. Just because a federal employee didn't show up at what used to the be their doorstep the day after the storm doesn't mean they are somehow forgotten. Of course they are going to see local response first. How about a little rational thought? If they want to use this as more ammunition to hate the government that abandons them and gives all their aid to illegal transgenders and foreign countries instead of their own white trash population, I'm sure they'll be happy to rebuild their entire towns, roads, and infrastructure without any federal assistance. But that won't happen. The government WILL help them rebuild (even though some areas probably shouldn't be rebuilt), and they will only hate them more or give all credit to their orange God. I'm tired of the ungrateful fiercely independent but yet someone still extremely needy backwoods hick victim routine. Help yourself, or don't.

I've lived my whole life around these people. I just needed to get that off my chest. Now back to your regularly scheduled programming.

10/14/2024 10:55:47 AM

No one expected day one assistance, but by day 7 and people hadn't seen anyone but the volunteers, they really started to distrust anyone saying the government was there to help.

10/14/2024 11:54:38 AM

^^Don't tread on me!

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/hurricane-helene-response-disrupted-militia-fema-1235133009/

10/14/2024 12:38:09 PM

that's such a garbage article.

10/14/2024 12:53:52 PM

this sure seems to confirm what is alleged in what you deemed a garbage article:

https://www.wral.com/story/man-arrested-western-nc-fema-locations-reopen-after-threats-against-workers/21672882/

[Edited on October 14, 2024 at 1:12 PM. Reason : .]

10/14/2024 1:09:45 PM

^ clearly...

10/14/2024 1:17:30 PM

Hundreds of troops are pulled out from one man being arrested in a disaster area? Seems like a political narrative is being pushed.

10/14/2024 2:12:47 PM

Check out this winner:



Rutherford County's Finest!

10/14/2024 2:35:27 PM

^^I’d take Rutherford County Sheriff’s word that this dude acted alone with a grain of salt. RC sheriff has had Sheriff Chuck Wright from Spartanburg County, SC attached to his hip for the last 1.5 weeks. Go watch some of Chuck Wright’s social media/youtube vids (I have no idea what he was actually posting on) and then let me know who has a political agenda.

The best part is some local TV news station got both these Sheriff’s on via satellite feed yesterday. The backpedaling was absolutely delicious.

https://www.wyff4.com/article/chuck-wright-helene-response-viral-video/62582122

The article title is “no apologies” but he walked back like 75% of his original viral chest beating video. Just another bitch ass boomer running their mouth on social media and then suddenly realizing there actually can be real life consequences to never shutting the fuck up.

10/14/2024 4:17:38 PM

Who in here sides with the terrorists?

10/14/2024 5:09:05 PM

^^ what a shocker

10/14/2024 6:07:01 PM

^^^^^for which side though???

10/14/2024 6:35:06 PM

^^^I work in Spartanburg County, SC. I happened to see the unhinged ranting video of Tweedledee and Tweedledum this weekend (by accident -- doubles as a Sean Hannity fan video), and it sent me down a rabbit hole of Chuck Wright videos. He's a real gem. I think they should get together with Sheriff Ronnie Fields of Moore County to find the real terrorists!

There's a local guy on YouTube who pretty much trolls the Spartanburg Sheriff's Department nonstop.

10/14/2024 7:45:55 PM

^its pretty clear Sheriff Wright is trying to become a MAGA celebrity. Like moths to a flame these people run towards the cameras, AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY, prepared to say the most outlandish and offensive shit they can invent, although more often it’s all borrowed talking points. The entire goal is to go viral and piss off anyone that doesn’t view politics as a game. We call it the Madison Cawthorn playbook here in WNC, but there are so many of these types in our system right now so take your pick.

What’s sad is it’s an effective strategy. Like Sheriff Wright will probably run for Governor or Senator or some shit in South Carolina and win in the near future.

10/14/2024 9:00:56 PM

That could be correct. He's under a state ethics investigation, though.

I suppose that probably helps his stature in MAGAworld.

10/14/2024 9:10:14 PM

One toke over the thin blue line

10/14/2024 9:20:11 PM

^yea what the fuck. Who holds a cigarette like that. I know I definitely don’t have the balls to ever talk to a cop like that, no matter the situation.

10/14/2024 10:34:20 PM

Well, he's not black if that's what you're referring to.

10/15/2024 8:30:08 AM

Lol at MagaDrvr

10/15/2024 9:18:55 AM

Hmm, the news is now walking back the entire "truck load of militia".....




^oooh, still name calling. I guess you didn't ever grow up.
You don't like that I'm just going off what my entire team experienced while we were actually there?

10/15/2024 9:31:54 AM

^Amurrica just isn't great enough right now, is it?

10/15/2024 11:24:32 AM