Elementary school provides shelter to Helene evacuees in Yancey County

YANCEY COUNTY, N.C. — An elementary school in western North Carolina has been transformed into a shelter for survivors of Helene. It’s set up in hard-hit Yancey County and gives a temporary home to those who don’t have one anymore.

“Really, the whole school has become part of the shelter essentially,” said Heather Cox, the interim principal of Blue Ridge Elementary School.

Once used for learning, the classrooms now house lifesaving supplies and provide shelter.

>> Click here for a list of resources available in Yancey County

“This pod here is medical,” Cox said.

“And what was this?” Channel 9′s Hannah Goetz asked.

“This was our first grade pod. The others are sleeping quarters for dayshift and nightshift for Red Cross,” she said.

The school gym looks different too. Cots line the walls and the bleachers are now nightstands. You won’t hear kids playing on the basketball court. You actually won’t hear much at all, except for conversations like one Goetz had with an evacuee.

Oakland Bryant was eating lunch at the foot of his cot when Goetz met him.

“I was born and raised here,” he said.

Three weeks ago, before Helene hit, he was safe and sound in his Yancey County home. But that changed quickly.

“It washed our mountain road all the way down to the river coming out there,” Bryant said. “All you can see is a river here in front of me. Lost one of our neighbors.”

Now, home is the Blue Ridge Elementary School gym.

“I don’t even know if we can get in there or not,” he told Goetz, adding, “They evacuated us with a chopper.”

A rescue team carried Bryant out of his home in his wheelchair. They took him through the rushing water and airlifted him to safety. He had no time or room to take anything with him.

“Was there anything you hope is there when you get back?” Goetz asked.

“My wife’s pictures and my grandbabies’ — I got six granddaughters,” Bryant said.

Not knowing what’s left of his home or what’s next, he, like so many others, is somehow finding a way to be thankful.

“You got a place to lay down, food to eat, so everything’s alright,” Bryant said. “You know, can’t complain.”

“Yeah, it’s tough. But a fellow has to take it as it comes,” he added.

He’s getting help from people like Principal Cox, who is now helping the Red Cross run the shelter.

“It is very humbling,” she said. “I grew up here. This is my community.”

Cox went door to door after the storm to check on every student she hadn’t heard from.

“Seeing them was so awesome. But seeing the destruction that we have in the county, it’s really hard,” she said.

Just like Bryant, Cox is trying to see the good in all the bad.

“Seeing the love of everybody else, and just that grace and that ‘giving-ness,’ it doesn’t take away or cancel out all the bad,” she said. “It just, it makes it a little better, though. It just helps it a little bit more.”

You might have heard Goetz on the radio Thursday morning talking about her experience in the mountains. On Thursday, Radio One Charlotte partnered with Second Harvest Food Bank of Metrolina to support Helene survivors.

You have until 7 p.m. to call into any of these Charlotte stations and donate.

By 3 p.m., the food bank said the radiothon had raised $10,000.

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