Hurricane Helene Recap: Catastrophic Surge, Inland Flooding From Florida To The Appalachians

Hurricane Helene plowed into Florida with catastrophic storm surge and damaging winds, then dumped prolific rainfall inland over the Southeast, triggering historic, devastating river flooding in the Carolinas and Tennessee.

A​ historic landfall: Helene made landfall at 11:10 p.m. EDT Sept. 26 about 10 miles west-southwest of Perry, Florida, at Category 4 intensity packing 140-mph winds, and a pressure of 938 millibars, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Helene was the strongest hurricane on record to landfall in Florida's Big Bend region, stronger than 2023's Idalia, which made a Category 3 landfall with 115 mph winds and a pressure of 950 millibars, and an 1896 Cedar Keys hurricane's 125 mph winds.

H​elene was also the third hurricane to landfall in Florida's Big Bend region in just under 13 months. Three of the last five hurricanes to landfall in the mainland U.S. have done so in this Big Bend region.

S​torm surge: A peak storm surge is estimated to have reached more than 15 feet above ground in the Florida Big Bend region based on post-storm modeling. The area will be surveyed at a later time to reveal the actual measured storm surge heights.

I​n Cedar Key, an estimated 9.3 feet of inundation and peak surge of 10.33 feet appeared to surpass the town's record surge from an 1896 hurricane.

H​elene's surge also appeared to break modern-day record levels for the Tampa-St. Petersburg metro area, with inundation of 6 to 7.2 feet above ground level recorded by tidal gauges. Clearwater Beach topped its surge record from the March 1993 Superstorm, while St. Petersburg bested their record from Hurricane Elena in 1985.

Significant flooding was also reported at Ft. Myers Beach and Naples, where gauges measured 4 to 5 feet of surge inundation. According to a ham radio operator, water 5 to 6 feet above normal levels was observed in the Punta Gorda Canal Network.

R​ainfall flooding: The combination of heavy rain a day ahead of Helene - something meteorologists call a "predecessor rain event" - and Helene's rain over hilly and mountainous terrain triggered catastrophic flash and river flooding from Georgia to the western Carolinas, eastern Tennessee and southwestern Virginia.

R​ecord flood crests were measured in at least eight locations in North Carolina and Tennessee, including the Pigeon River in Newport, Tennessee, French Broad River at Rosman, North Carolina, and the Swannanoa River at Biltmore (near Asheville), North Carolina. In parts of western North Carolina, records that had stood since the "Great Flood" of July 1916 were smashed.

F​loodwaters coursed through parts of Asheville and Boone, North Carolina. They washed at least one section of Interstate 40,​ flooded a Tennessee hospital prompting rooftop helicopter evacuations and compromised a dam, forcing the evacuation of Newport, Tennessee.

A​t one time on Sept. 27, the National Weather Service had over 20 flash flood emergencies - their highest level flash flood alert - in effect from the Atlanta, Georgia, metro to southwest Virginia. That was the most issued for any day in at least 13 years.

R​ainfall totals topped a foot in parts of Florida, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina. The top total is nearly 30 inches near Busick, North Carolina. Asheville, North Carolina, smashed their all-time 24-hour (8.37 inches), two-day (9.89 inches) and three-day (13.98 inches) all-time rainfall records that had stood for almost 106 years, according to weather historian Christopher Burt and the Southeast Regional Climate Center. Atlanta also smashed its all-time 48-hour rainfall record (11.12 inches) that had stood since 1886.

T​here were over 270 reports of rainfall flooding from northern Florida into western Virginia over a 48-hour period through the afternoon of Sept. 27.

Helene's intensity at landfall and its fast forward speed allowed high winds to push much farther inland than typical for a landfalling hurricane.

W​ind gusts from 90 to 100 mph were clocked in several locations in Florida and southern Georgia, topped by Perry, Florida (99 mph), as well as between Live Oak, Florida, and Valdosta, Georgia. A gust as high as 82 mph was measured as far north as Augusta, Georgia, a 70 mph gust was measured as far north as Anderson, South Carolina, and 60-plus mph gusts were clocked as far north as Dayton, Ohio, Indianapolis (68 mph) and Coles County, Illinois.

T​he strongest measured gust over land was a 106 mph gust measured atop Mt. Mitchell, North Carolina (6,684 feet elevation).

B​y Sept. 27, over 4 million customers were without power due to the storm from Florida to Virginia to Indiana.

Tornadoes: Landfalling hurricanes often spin up tornadoes in outer rainbands both before and well after landfall, and Helene was no exception.

P​ending finalization of National Weather Service storm surveys, over a dozen tornadoes may have been spawned from time before landfall (Sept. 25-26) and after landfall (Sept. 27) from Georgia to West Virginia.

P​rior to landfall, a tornado in southeast Georgia's Wheeler County destroyed a mobile home, claiming two lives.

O​ne of the most damaging tornadoes - rated EF3 - struck Rocky Mount, North Carolina, on Sept. 27. Approximately 11 buildings were damaged with 15 injuries in this eastern North Carolina twister. This is rare intensity for a tornado within a tropical cyclone. From 1995 through 2023, only five of 1,782 tornadoes spawned by a hurricane, tropical storm or depression was of EF3 intensity, according to NOAA's Storm Prediction Center.

A​n EF2 tornado in southwest Virginia's Pittsylvania County injured one.

Track history: T​he need to issue tropical storm warnings and hurricane watches for western Cuba and Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula prompted the NHC to begin advisories on Potential Tropical Cyclone Nine in the western Caribbean Sea on Sept. 23.

T​he following morning, Tropical Storm Helene formed as bands of rain and strong winds lashed Cancún and Cozumel. Helene also produced heavy rain and some tropical storm force gusts over parts of western Cuba.

H​elene then became a hurricane over the southern Gulf of Mexico on Sept. 25, then rapidly intensified into a Category 4 hurricane in the evening before landfall on Sept. 26.

Helene became the second major hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season Thursday afternoon. Early in the evening, a NOAA Hurricane Hunter mission found maximum winds had increased Category 4 intensity just hours before landfall.