More than 160 people dead after onslaught of Hurricane Helene

Rebuilding efforts could take years, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has said. Biden has allowed survivors to apply for federal assistance money by making disaster declarations in various states.

On Monday, Biden referenced reports that up to 600 people were unaccounted for. “God willing, they’re alive,” he said. “But there’s no way to contact them again because of the lack of cell phone coverage.”

More than a million people in some of the affected states also remained without power on Wednesday morning, according to monitoring site Poweroutage.us.

Initial analysis of the storm already suggests that human-induced climate change played a significant role in the amount of rainfall that was dumped.

After Helene hit late on Thursday, record flood crests were measured in at least seven locations in North Carolina and Tennessee.

In parts of western North Carolina, records that had stood since the “Great Flood” of July 1916 were smashed.

The Atlantic hurricane season continues until the end of November. The waters of the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean are currently above average temperatures, meaning that it is possible that still more powerful storms could develop.