Helene headed to Florida's Gulf Coast

One of my brothers lives in downtown Newport.

 

It may turn out that the most long lasting damage from this storm will be in western NC.
Dams, bridges, roads, all kinds of infrastructure gone in some of the hardest areas to replace it.

 

Saw a post on Facebook about this and one of the comments mentioned this is what happens when you spend trillions on a war machine instead of infrastructure over the years. Maybe a bit simplistic but probably some truth to it.

Also apparently the governor has yet to declare a state of emergency? Recieving criticism for not having done that in advance of the storm.

 

Pigeon river NC/TENN is 26ft above flood stage and 14 feet above "major" flood stage.

Unbelievable.

 

MJ on Instagram: "MJ Morning Show on 104.7 FM Q105 Tampa Bay. A Tesla Model S parked in a South Tampa garage ignited, presumably after storm surge from #hurricanehelene infiltrated the battery cells and completely destroyed this multi-million dollar home. Everybody escaped the fire at 3 a.m. The roads were impossible and Tampa Fire and Rescue could not even enter the neighborhood. The family and adjacent neighbors were rescued with small watercraft from the amazing @greybullrescue. #tesla #teslafire #hurricanehelene #helene #tampa #tampabay #southtampa #hurricane #florida #disaster ter #fire"

Video of one of the houses that burned down from a Tesla fire because of the storm

 

The stadium is uphill from downtown, my guess is it is a good place to be relatively. The arena area however. Yikes.

 

Word from Newport Tenn may be a little better than feared. Duke Energy is reporting the dam has NOT failed. Though the river is continuing to rise a bit more and could lead to more flooding in Newport

 

Just walked the neighborhood to the W of me and apparently the water surged closer than I thought. Many multiple million dollar built up homes had their garages flooded and the older homes were completely flooded. saw several people already pulling out rugs and carpet.

One house had a garage fire, talked to the neighbor and she said it was his Tesla that went up.

This particular area sits at a 5-8 ft elevation.

The video of the house/Tesla fire I posted from Instagram happened further away in Culbreath Isles, on Old Tampa Bay.

 

When asked about this, LSU boosters complained that this will cost them future *bonus* home games if Florida knows this far in advance.

 

Thanks for the thoughts Davis. We will be staying at my brothers tonight, but us and the kids are a bit much, so we might try to go through a circuit of all our friends in the coming days. Not sure what it will take to make the place minimally livable.

 

I missed what you found. Water in the house ,obvs. How high?

 

Thanks for all you’ve done over the past two days. It’s really appreciated.

Man, so thankful we don’t still live in Sunset Park, on the water three blocks west of Westshore. I’m sure that area was flooded and is a mess.

 

Lucky, only $3k for me but thinking about paying off house and self insuring.

 

About a foot in our sunken rooms and a couple inches in the rest of the house. Good news is that our appliances might be ok, but Unfortunately there was water in every room, so all walls might be compromised. It’s kind of a gross disaster in the house right now.