We spent just four days in Asheville this past August, rather than the seven we planned, following the CrowdStrike software fiasco that shut down airports throughout the country. We visited my son, Byron, and his family, mostly to see my granddaughter Sadie who turned 15 in September. She now has a learner’s driving permit which may not be of much use until North Carolina rebuilds the hundreds of miles of roads and bridges washed away by flash floods precipitated by Hurricane Helene. Unlike those of us in the American west who have some appreciation for the speed and power of dryland downpours, the Appalachians rarely, if ever, experience 24 inches of rain dropping in 24 hours.

The French Broad River, one of the few in North America that runs from south to north, is thought to be the oldest riverbed in North America. Most of the time it is a shallow, meandering watercourse similar to the South Platte through Denver. It turned the gentrifying riverfront arts district, similar to Denver’s RINO, into a roaring flume that buried 14-wheelers parked at New Belgium’s eastern brewery in mud to the top of their trailers, dislodging both brew vats and warehouse buildings. More than two weeks on, heavy construction equipment is still unable to reach the facility. When we finally reached my son by phone last Sunday evening, he reported he was sitting in the dark with his dog on his lap — no electricity, no internet and no running water — and his phone propped up in the only spot where he could receive spasmodic cell service.

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The family crashed for 10 days with friends in Charlotte before the girls left on a long-planned shopping trip to New York City. Byron had returned home, after commuting two hours each way to his job at Mission Hospital in Asheville. He confirmed reports the hospital emergency room had operated for several days using flashlights and boiling its surgical instruments in bottled water. Although not a stringent “prepper,” more like “prep light,” he has 60 gallons of water stored in the basement. “You can get by without power or internet I’ve learned, but you have to have water,” he discovered. Of course, you can’t cook until power is restored either. Although life is beginning to return to normal, the hospital has had to place handwashing stations and port-a-potties on the sidewalks of its main building. The recently opened new wing installed an electric soap dispensing system in its bathrooms fed from a central sanitizer tank that reaches every sink. It was not hooked into the emergency power feed, however. So, no soap for now.

The municipal water system is not expected to be operational for another seven weeks. Public schools are trying to figure out how to get kids back into classrooms — most of them are students who attended class by Zoom for more than a year during the COVID pandemic. While internet service is being gradually restored, download speeds are reduced by 85%. But there is plenty of help in town, despite reports to the contrary from the Donald Trump campaign. French-speaking repair crews from Quebec are restoring power lines. When only my son’s side of the street had power turned on this week, everyone from the other side of the street walked across to BBQ and party while charging their phones. José Andrés and the World Central Kitchen is feeding thousands daily downtown while platoons of workers in red, yellow and chartreuse vests mill about in the streets. Another group of muscled young men wearing black T-shirts that say, “Federal Police” provide security, although no one has figured out just who they report to.

J.D. Vance took the time off from campaigning to write a piece for the Wall Street Journal damning the federal response to Hurricane Helene. His most outrageous lie was, “Under Ms. Harris and Mr. Biden, FEMA has funneled millions of dollars to non-governmental organizations whose stated goal is facilitating mass migration into the U. S. The effort stems from a White House directive to reorient FEMA’s institutional focus from U.S. citizens and towards aliens.” One of those NGOs is Catholic Social Services which, yes, advocates for the humane treatment of asylum applicants and is also on the ground in Asheville. As a recent convert to Catholicism, Vance should contemplate Pope Francis’ criticism of his running mate’s vicious attacks on migrants.

FEMA has thrown up a trailer village served by more rows of port-a-potties. Local television broadcasts and most cell service is available once again. One of the bigger problems is the thousands of trees that have fallen across the city. The beautiful, expansive white oaks you see throughout the southeast  apparently grow huge but are balanced atop shallow root systems. With a hundred-year lifespan, they were easily flattened by Helene’s winds. Unlike our lodgepole pines, which can be cut up with a handheld chainsaw, these behemoths have trunks that can approach eight feet in diameter. Their wood is worth thousands of dollars and property owners are tagging them for lumber yards. Curfews at 7 p.m., designed to allow for nighttime movement of heavy equipment, has been moved back to 11 p.m. In rural areas, ravines are clogged with everything from school buses to entire homes. A clean-up may require years. Cadaver teams are scouring mountainsides for hundreds who remain missing.

Losses are estimated at $110 billion in North Carolina alone. Whether or not you believe global warming is a hoax, property and casualty insurers have gotten Mother Nature’s message. Between western forest fires and eastern flooding, homeowner premiums are jumping astronomically. Policies that recently averaged a thousand dollars annually in Florida are now being quoted at a thousand dollars a month. Here in Colorado, HOAs are anticipating 100% increases in 2025. At the same time local governments are encouraging more townhouse projects, insurers are growing hesitant to issue multi-unit policies which place them on the hook for disasters. Currently, HOAs are abandoning joint coverage and requiring residents to insure their own units. This spreads risk, but some form of state-guaranteed reinsurance may have to be provided soon. The Front Range flooding that occurred a decade ago as well as the Marshall Fire in Boulder County, are unlikely to prove one-offs. There’s more than inflation at work here, even though Florida’s Gov. Ron DeSantis has forbidden use of the phrase, “climate change,” while the North Carolina legislature refuses to allow references to “sea level rise.”

Miller Hudson is a public affairs consultant and a former Colorado legislator.