Hurricane Helene caused widespread damage, stretching more than 600 miles from where the storm made landfall in Florida’s Big Bend region as a Category 4 storm on Sept. 26 into North Carolina and Tennessee.
Helene also left a trail of destruction in South Carolina — from Aiken to Greenwood and Newberry to Anderson, Greenville and Spartanburg — across much of the western half of the state. More than a million homes and businesses were without power for days, some even weeks.
Since morning on Sept. 27, SCBaptist Disaster Relief chainsaw and feeding crews have been serving our neighbors and sharing the gospel. They have been cutting trees off of the roofs of houses, feeding storm victims and linemen, cleaning laundry, clearing roadways, providing hot showers, delivering gas and working tools, and praying with hurting people.
“Most teams now are focused on recovery and chainsaw work,” Susan Peugh, director of SCBaptist Disaster Relief, told The Baptist Courier Oct. 15. A DR site in Spartanburg, she said, was being shifted to mass feeding in North Carolina to provide meals and supplies for the affected area around Lake Lure and Chimney Rock.
Driving around the state in the days following the storm, Tony Wolfe, executive director-treasurer for the South Carolina Baptist Convention, said he saw months and months of work to do. “This may be the biggest disaster, at least in terms of wind damage, that our state has ever known,” he said.
“Hurricane Helene has devastated our state from coast to coast,” he said. “The hurricane-force wind damage in the Upstate is matched by 18 confirmed tornadoes stretching all the way to the coastline. From Fort Mill to Hilton Head and Long Creek to North Myrtle Beach, South Carolinians are in for a very long recovery effort.”
Wolfe urged more South Carolina Baptists to become involved by giving generously to disaster relief and volunteering.
“The need for active, physical labor across our state will not subside for many months,” he said, “and who better to serve our neighbors as the hands and feet of Jesus than SCBaptists?
“SCBaptists are a generous people, and I am confident they will rise to this opportunity to help our state recover from the desolation that Helene has brought,” he said.
— Todd Deaton is chief operating officer for The Baptist Courier.