Before And After Images Show Hurricane Helene Destruction in North Carolina

New satellite images show the damage left by Hurricane Helene in two towns in North Carolina.
Images collected by Maxar from October 2 show areas of the towns of Old Fort and Spruce Pine wiped away or damaged after tropical cyclone made landfall in Florida on September 26 and swept through the southeast of America.
Hurricane Helene was the strongest hurricane on record to make landfall in Florida’s Big Bend region, the Weather Channel reported, and caused damage in an area spanning 400 miles, according to ABC News.
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In the before photos, the roads and buildings are all in tact, trees are still standing and the vegetation around appears green. However, in the images taken on Wednesday, damage to the infrastructure can be seen, a lot of the surrounding greenery turned brown from flooding, while trees have been toppled.
It was reported that after Helene, 30 inches of rainfall were recorded in North Carolina, the biggest local flooding in recorded history, according to ABC News.
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Social media users have also been posting before and after photos online to show the damage left by Helene.
The X user @EvonDesign posted a photograph of Chimney Rock, North Carolina, from nine days before the storm, compared to the state of the scene after.
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The Highway 9 can be seen with cars parked outside businesses on the side of the road in the before photo, yet after, brown floodwater appears to have washed the entire area away.
Chris Gloninger, a meteorologist, posted satellite footage on X, showing views of various places in Florida and how the storm surge had completely wiped out homes near the ocean.
AccuWeather had previously predicted the cost of the damage from Helene would be between $95 billion-$110 billion, but now estimates it could be between $145 billion and $160 billion.
The storm surge had been more than 15 feet above ground level in parts of Florida, ABC News reported, and there were more than 20 reported tornadoes across Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia during the storm.
At least 182 were killed in the storm, according to ABC News, and Saturday morning, around 3.7 million Americans in the region did not have power.
More than one million Americans were still left without power four days after the storm.
South Carolina, the worst-affected state, had 755,313 outages recorded early Monday, while Georgia had 580,771, North Carolina 457,941, Florida 133,492 and Virginia 100,584.
Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky and Tennessee also experienced a loss of power.
The governors of Florida, Georgia and North Carolina had all declared state of emergencies ahead of Helene’s landfall, and preparations were being made throughout the days leading up to the forecasted storm.
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