{"id":851181,"date":"2026-09-17T17:30:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T17:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/851181\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T17:30:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T17:30:12","slug":"helene-exposed-appalachias-flood-risks-experts-explain-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/851181\/","title":{"rendered":"Helene exposed Appalachia\u2019s flood risks; experts explain why"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>ASHEVILLE, N.C. (WLOS) \u2014 As western North Carolina approaches two years since Helene, experts are examining why Appalachian communities are vulnerable to flooding.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I was always trying to kind of keep myself uplifted and I kept telling myself, well, this is a story you get to tell your grandkids one day at your birthday party and maybe somebody would film it,&#8221; said Bat Cave resident Alexus Mae Freeman about her Helene experience.<\/p>\n<p><p>Helene exposed Appalachia\u2019s flood risks; experts explain why. (WMYA)<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Freeman is a writer attending the University of North Carolina Asheville. She says she attended the school\u2019s lecture: Appalachian Flooding in Fact and Fiction, to better understand the destruction she witnessed during Helene.<\/p>\n<p>At the event, a literary scholar examined representations of flooding in Appalachian literature, and a forest hydrologist spoke about flood vulnerability here in Appalachian communities.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/wlos.com\/news\/local\/over-3-million-dollars-awarded-repair-hurricane-tropical-storm-helene-damaged-dams-western-north-carolina-turner-shoals-beech-lake-ashe-dam\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">OVER $3.4M AWARDED TO REPAIR HELENE-DAMAGED DAMS IN WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are vulnerable here because we are at the convergence of different weather systems that collide with the Appalachian Mountains,&#8221; said forest hydrologist Nicolas Zegre.<\/p>\n<p>He says almost all infrastructure in the Appalachian Mountains is located at the base of valleys where rivers are present.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have a high flood risk throughout the Appalachian region because there&#8217;s only so many places we can build,&#8221; said Zegre.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/wlos.com\/news\/local\/pvc-pipe-manufacturer-ipex-makes-500k-commitment-for-helene-debris-cleanup-mountaintrue-nonprofit-north-carolina-department-environmental-quality-french-broad-river-hurricane-tropical-storm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">PVC PIPE MANUFACTURER IPEX MAKES $500K COMMITMENT FOR HELENE DEBRIS CLEANUP<\/a><\/p>\n<p>He said floods and storms have changed over the years.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Heavy rainfall is increasing everywhere,&#8221; said Zegre. &#8220;There&#8217;s more water being evaporated from our forests and from our rivers and from our lakes and from our soils and from our fields, and the atmosphere can hold more water.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He said while the flooding situation isn\u2019t improving, he hopes that having a greater understanding of why floods happen will help people better prepare. <\/p>\n<p>Freeman says she left the lecture with more hope for the future.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Actually, getting to hear tonight how this happened was really, really, really healing in a lot of ways,&#8221; said Freeman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ASHEVILLE, N.C. (WLOS) \u2014 As western North Carolina approaches two years since Helene, experts are examining why Appalachian&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":851182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[192,79],"class_list":["post-851181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/851181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=851181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/851181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/851182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=851181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=851181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=851181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}