A week has passed since Hurricane Helene made landfall and the death toll continues to climb as areas devastated by the storm and its aftermath.
The death toll confirmed on Thursday climbed to at least 202 people killed in six states, NBC News reported. Helene became the deadliest hurricane since Katrina in 2005.
The news outlet said that more than half of those killed were in areas of North Carolina where entire communities were wiped off the map.
There were still hundreds listed as missing while some of those who have been found were difficult to identify.
Cajun Navy founder and CEO Robert Gaudet told CNN “We’ve done a lot of disasters. We went to Maui for the wildfires. We’ve never seen anything like this.”
The Cajun Navy is a group of volunteers founded after Katrina who do disaster rescue.
“When there’s feet of mud filling up properties and homes and an entire town is washed into a lake … and it’s not just what you see, but it’s where you can drive for hours and hours and see the destruction and damage, you lose a sense of how life has been and how it is for you really quickly,” Gaudet told CNN.
He pointed out that before the death toll rose it was at 100, but that was those who had been recovered. The number will probably continue to climb.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency was still working to find out how many people were missing. There were more than 3,500 FEMA personnel sent to areas hit by Helene but more will be on the way.
Power was still out in some areas. Some areas in Georgia and North Carolina have more than 90% of customers without power, utility companies said.
USA Today reported one million homes and businesses are without power.
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