The images and video of damage from Hurricane Helene have been inescapable — massive flooding has wiped entire communities off the map. More than 200 people have been killed, with first responders continuing to recover bodies daily. And only now, are groups starting to put a real financial toll on the disaster.
Helene hit Florida and moved north into Georgia and Mississippi before entering Tennessee. Its outer reaches stretched far into North Carolina and Virginia, fueling itself off the warm, saturated ground. Large sections of Interstate 40 in western North Carolina and U.S. 58 across southern Virginia have eroded away, unlikely to be completely repaired for months.
An AccuWeather forecaster has pegged the financial cost of Helene’s damage at $225 billion to $250 billion, far more than initial estimates in the days after the storm. It’s also significantly higher than other major hurricanes, like 2012’s Sandy and 2017’s Harvey, and it’s unclear how much of that total will be covered by insurance. Early estimates from one U.S. Department of Agriculture official the damage to crops could trigger $7 billion in insurance payouts.
The Virginia Cooperative Extension said its state’s costs to farms and agricultural operations in Southwest Virginia could reach well over $125 million. The Georgia Department of Agriculture said that about a third of that state’s crop — particularly pecans — has been impacted, and it’s very likely that the toll could be over $1 billion.
U.S. Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack said that USDA is taking measures like extending disaster program signup opportunities and using waivers and emergency procedures to expedite recovery efforts on America’s working lands. The department has also deployed 190 staff, including many from the U.S. Forest Service, to assist with response efforts, to include removal of debris from roads.
North Carolina, which saw historic flooding that triggered some of the worst and deadliest impacts from Helene, said that $500,000 low-interest disaster loans from the U.S. Small Business Administration are available to businesses and residents following the announcement of a presidential disaster declaration. Farms in the western part of North Carolina have been described as “unrecognizable.”
On Friday, Florida Commissioner of Agriculture Wilton Simpson announced the approval of the first Helene recovery loan through the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services’ Agriculture and Aquaculture Producers Natural Disaster Recovery Loan Program.
The program includes interest-free loans up to $500,000 for eligible agriculture and aquaculture producers that have experienced damage or destruction from Helene. The loans may be used to restore, repair, or replace essential physical property, including fences, equipment, greenhouses, and other buildings, or to remove vegetative debris.
Florida could be threatened again as Hurricane Milton grows to a Category 5 storm and barrels toward the peninsula. Luckily for other states, though, the projected path of Milton will take it northeast over the Atlantic Ocean and not passing directly over other land.
