Day 39 of the Apocalypse, Ground Zero, Gerton, NC pop. 231

Earlier this year, our Community Center had a showing of an hour-long documentary about The Great Flood of 1916. Up until Helene, it was the flood by which all other floods were measured here in Western North Carolina. It, too, was considered a 1,000 year event.

The Great Flood of 1916 caused the most destruction and devastation to date in our part of North Carolina, close to $500 million in today’s currency.
The Flood was the result of two tropical storms converging here in the mountains. The first came up from the Gulf of Mexico via Alabama on July 5th, as a Category Three hurricane. That storm reached the mountains by July 7th and then stalled, dumping water for seven days straight. By the end, the rivers were at flood stage.

A second storm arrived on July 14th, from the Atlantic via Charleston, South Carolina, with torrential rains that heaped 22 inches of rainfall in 24 hours on the mountains.

Floodwaters still rose even after the rains stopped on July 16th because the water had nowhere to go. The French Broad River, which runs through Asheville, expanded from a maximum width of 381 feet to nearly 1,500 feet, or a third of a mile.

The water reached 21 feet in height, which is 17 feet above flood stage. With Helene, the water reached 31 feet in height.

During the Great Flood, dams burst. Bridges were demolished. Asheville’s power plant was destroyed. Railroad tracks were suspended 60 feet in the air, with no bridge to hold them up.

The rivers rose up so quickly, that people had to abandon cars and climb trees to save themselves. Eighty people were officially declared dead, although many suspect the number was much higher. Just like with Helene, mudslides wiped out entire families. People in 1916, just like us, dreaded to learn of the real extent of the devastation.

Jeff and I had a conflict and weren’t able to attend the documentary showing. But the idea remained, that we needed to understand what caused this event, so we could be sure to prevent it from happening to us.

Someone from the community center offered to lend us the documentary videotape. Our friend Jen gave us her VCR so we could watch it. The VCR sat in the back seat of Jeff’s truck for weeks. But for whatever reason we never got the tape.

Our logical minds kicked into gear. Surely we couldn’t be affected by this kind of flooding, because we live so far up a mountain. Surely the infrastructure of our area has changed so dramatically in the past 108 years that our rivers couldn’t flood now.

On some level, we believed this documentary would give us evidence that a great flood couldn’t happen to us, too. Watching it would make us immune.
As the months passed, the Great Flood became a niggling thought in the recesses of our minds. Something that we knew we needed to pay attention to but never quite found a way to.

Our intuition always knows.

How did our Community Center happen to show this documentary only four months before Helene hit?

How did Jeff and I know to pay attention?

Most intuitive guidance is illogical. Often it’s inconvenient or strange. The more we follow it though, the more we are Divinely guided and protected. Those little niggling thoughts matter.

When I hiked down the mountain, and saw the devastation for myself on Day 4, I immediately thought about the people in 1916, and their grandchildren and great-grandchildren, who still live on this mountain. The fear they must have felt when the rain was pounding down so hard, and the wind was whipping by. Their genetic makeup includes the Great Flood.

In my work as a Trauma Chaplain, families who have been here for generations shared with me the stories of their grandparents, and great-grandparents during the Flood. Babies ripped from their mother’s arms. Older family members who couldn’t get to higher ground quickly enough, and who perished. This is the legacy of these families. To never again experience what the generations before them had to experience.

But then it happened to them, too.

This land carries the imprint of the Great Flood as well. It remembers how the water moved then. Now it also carries the memory of Helene. The land never forgets.

What we choose to pay attention to matters.

Cherokee Indians believe our Hickory Nut Gorge is protected by Spirits. This 14-mile, 20,000-acre-long canyon is one of the oldest routes through Southern Appalachia. People have been here for a very, very long time.

There are stories about Little People living in the cliffs of the Gorge. As far back as recorded history in our area, people have seen, felt, and written about the Little People. They have been called, “Little People”, “Fairies”, and to the Cherokees “Yunwi Tsundsdi.” Yunwi-Tsunsdi is a race of small humanoid nature spirits, sometimes referred to in English as “dwarfs” or “fairies.” They are said to have magical powers and to protect people who regard this land as sacred. Legend is that Little People are here to teach lessons about living in harmony with nature and with others.

When we moved into our house, we would find one of these Little People wandering around our living room late at night. Our contractor had told us months prior that his crew felt someone in the house when they were working late, but we thought they were just superstitious.

This very old, very tiny woman, with hair almost the length of her body, started showing up every night, for weeks. Jeff and I both saw her. We felt that she was connected to the land more than the house because she seemed very confused by technology. She wasn’t a threatening spirit, it simply felt like this land was her home, and she didn’t want us here. In retrospect, maybe she was offering us protection. Maybe she knew what was coming with Helene, and was trying to warn us.

There are no coincidences. We are all connected, through energy, through genetics, through the land, and through our shared history. What will sustain humanity moving forward will be our willingness to listen, and pay attention.