President Biden ordered the Pentagon to deploy 1,000 active duty troops on Wednesday to the devastated region ravaged by Hurricane Helene in the Southeast.
Troops from Fort Liberty in Fayetteville, N.C., will be joining more than 6,000 National Guard members and 4,800 federal aid workers across the wide region.
With a death toll now at 176, many residents remain isolated across the mountains of Appalachia, with washed out roads and muddy debris. Broken water systems, downed power lines and poor cellphone service are complicating relief efforts. It is unclear how many people are still missing.
Listen below, as Laura Lee, news director for Blue Ridge Public Radio in Asheville, North Carolina, joined WTOP’s Michelle Basch and John Aaron to provide some current perspective from the ground, where more than 1.2 million people still have no power and rescuers are searching for people unaccounted for.
Biden will get an aerial view of the damage today, and plans to meet with officials at the emergency center in Raleigh, N.C., the state capital.
From NPR:
North Carolina election officials said Tuesday that early voting would start as planned on Oct. 17, including in counties that were devastated by flooding, but they don’t know how many early voting sites and Election Day polling places might be unusable in the swing state.
From The Hill:
Mars Boi Space Cadet Elon Musk said Tuesday that SpaceX is sending more Starlink terminals to the region.
