The damage caused by Hurricane Helene is proof that the U.S. must adapt building and insurance practices to a new reality as these natural hazards become normalized, says Daniel Aldrich, a Northeastern University researcher who serves as co-director of the Global Resilience Institute.
At least 95 people in six states have died in the wake of the Category 4 hurricane, which struck Florida’s Big Bend region on Thursday before unleashing days of flooding in the Southeast. Thirty-six lives have been claimed in North Carolina — including 30 in Buncombe County, serving the mountain city of Asheville, where about 600 missing person reports have been filed online. North Carolina was hit with the worst flooding in 100 years, including one community near Asheville in the western part of the state that was pounded with more than 2 feet of rain.
