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RiverGirl Fishing leading Helene recovery efforts in Todd [Video]
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RiverGirl Fishing leading Helene recovery efforts in Todd [Video]

REBUILDING EFFORTS FOLLOWING HELENE. COMMUNITIES ACROSS WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA CONTINUE TO BAND TOGETHER AND SUPPORT ONE ANOTHER AFTER HELENE WXII 12, JOSHUA DAVIS IS IN ASHE COUNTY FOLLOWING THE RELIEF EFFORTS OF LOCAL VOLUNTEERS AND THE WORK THEY SAY IS JUST BEGINNING. WEEKS AFTER HELENE TORE THROUGH PARTS OF WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA, MOUNTAIN COMMUNITIES CONTINUE TO PICK UP THE PIECES WITH PEOPLE FINDING DEBRIS LIKE THAT VAN OVER THERE SCATTERED ACROSS THE MOUNTAINS. WHEN WE REALLY STARTED SEEING THE MAGNITUDE OF THE DESTRUCTION AND TAUGHT ITSELF, THIS IS USUALLY THE TIME OF YEAR WHEN RIVER FISHING BEGINS TO WIND DOWN OPERATIONS. INSTEAD, ACTIVITY HERE IS RAMPING UP, WITH THE BUSINESS BECOMING A HELENE RELIEF COMMAND CENTER FOR THE TOWN OF TODD AND SURROUNDING MOUNTAIN COMMUNITIES. RENATA DOS SANTOS TELLS ME THEY STARTED SMALL, PICKING UP DEBRIS AROUND TOWN. FROM THERE, WE THEN MOVED TO FIREWOOD COLLECTION BECAUSE THAT WAS THE NEXT SET OF DEBRIS. AND THEN THE PROCESS IT BECAME DISTRIBUTING FOOD ITEMS AND GENERATORS, AND THEY CONTINUE TO EXPAND. LITTLE BY LITTLE, WE HAVE GROWN EVERY SINGLE DAY AS THE NEEDS COME IN, WE ADDRESS IT AND WE CREATE NEW LISTS SCATTERED AROUND TODD. VOLUNTEERS CONTINUE TO FIND EVERYTHING FROM HAY BALES, TRASH AND VEHICLES WASHED AWAY TO A BOAT. TODAY AND AN ICE MACHINE OUT OF A WOMANS DRIVEWAY THAT SHE DIDNT EVEN OWN THE BOAT, AND SHE JUST STOPPED AND GAVE US A HUG AND APPRECIATED EVERYTHING WERE DOING. JEFF JENKINS IS A RETIRED FIRE MARSHAL FROM LEXINGTON AND HAS BEEN HERE HELPING SINCE LAST WEEK. THEY NEED THEY NEED HANDS ON PEOPLE. THEY NEED PEOPLE THAT CAN PROVIDE CHAINSAWS, HANDS ON, HEAVY EQUIPMENT. KELEE MCCOY OF RIVER GIRL FISHING, SAYS THIS COMMUNITY WILL CONTINUE TO SEE THE SCARS LEFT BY HELENE FOR AT LEAST THE NEXT YEAR. I CANT EVEN PUT INTO WORDS LIKE I KNOW WATER IS POWERFUL, BUT THIS STORM HAS REALLY OPENED MY EYES TO THE DAMAGE THAT IT CAN TRULY DO. SMALL COMMUNITIES. WE ALL BAND TOGETHER AND WORK TOGETHER AND GET THE JOB DONE AND KELEE SAYS TOWNS LIKE TODD AND OTHER MOUNTAIN COMMUNITIES WILL CONTINUE TO NEED SUPPORT MOVING INTO WINTER. WELL HAVE A LINK TO THE TOWNS RELIEF FUND ON WXII 12.COM. IN ASHE

Charity flag football game in Peru, NY supports pancreatic cancer relief and school scholarships [Video]
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Small Business Funding

Charity flag football game in Peru, NY supports pancreatic cancer relief and school scholarships [Video]

FOR KIDS AND A CHANCE TO EXPERIENCE WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE A FIREFIGHTER. ONE TOWN IN THE NORTH COUNTRY STARTED A NEW TRADITION TO REMEMBER SOMEONE WHO HAD A LASTING IMPACT. NBC5 ERIC KERR HAS THE STORY FROM PERU. IT WAS A BATTLE IN FLAG FOOTBALL — AT PERU HIGH SCHOOL. A BATTLE OF THE BLUES. “Chris’ favorite game was football, he loved watching it, he’d love supporting it. I thknk he’d love it, he loved being a part of the state police, he loved being a Peru alumn, so just watching the two battle it together on the field would be really fun and exciting for him.” HIS DAUGHTERS MAGGIE AND ELLA — WERE PLEASED TO SEE SEVERAL CONTRIBUTIONS THROUGH PRIZE BASKETS — AND 50/50 RAFFLES — TO COLLECT MONEY DURING THE SHCOOL’S VARSITY SOCCER TEAMS — AND FOOTBALL TEAM’S GAMES THIS WEEKEND. A POSITIVE REFLECTION OF PERU’S OVERWHELMING SUPPORT. “It’s incredible. I’d never thought that people would come together this

How a WNC fire dept. is meeting Helene victims needs [Video]
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Small Business Funding

How a WNC fire dept. is meeting Helene victims needs [Video]

Todd is a small, unincorporated community on the border of Ashe and Watauga counties. The historic town sits along the New River and is a modern-day tourist retreat, according to longtime resident Bryan Bouboulis. We’ve got leaf-lookers in the fall, he said. During the summer, we have, for rafting, river floating companies, and it used to be timber and railroad.Get the latest news stories of interest by clicking hereBouboulis is the fire chief for the Todd Volunteer Fire Department. He says during the storm, things were not so picturesque in Todd. He saw it firsthand at his own home. Our house is about 20 feet off the river, he said. And we watched our house the river rise and flood the house, and watched our camper float down the river.Bouboulis hasnt let it get him down. Like other Todd fire volunteers, hes been working to fix his propertys damage and help out with relief efforts at the fire department. Once it’s over, it’s now the work begins, he said. And it’s just take it a day at a time, a step at a time.Keep up with the latest news and weather by downloading the WXII app here.That work has changed over the course of the past two weeks. Initially, Bouboulis said the fire departments focus was conducting welfare checks and cutting up fallen trees. He said, fortunately, everyone they checked on were accounted for. Then, he said that the focus became providing emergency supplies such as hot meals and clean water. This week, he said peoples needs have shifted more. Now we’re kind of transitioning to keeping people warm, Bouboulis said. Most of the people here have power now, so we’re still looking at heaters to keep people warm, dehumidifiers, things to dry houses out, clean the house out, things like that. So it’s a very fluid situation,He and other volunteers say theyve received an outpouring of support on social media from the community and from people across the country. He said truckloads of supplies have shown up at the fire department day after day. In one instance, he said an anonymous donor from Atlanta flew in supplies and had them sent specifically to Todd. Jennifer Danner, a first responder with the fire department, has been working to coordinate the departments social media. She says donors have been so supportive, the department has had to pause and resume donation drop-offs several times in order to keep up. She said when they post peoples specific needs, donations show up at the department within one day. Watch: NOWCAST streaming newscastsVolunteer firefighter Channa Ring has been leading the supply distribution. She said people are coming in for all kinds of items including food, cleaning supplies and fuel. However, she said its the little things making a big difference. I had a little girl come in; their house flooded. They lost everything, and she needed a new toothbrush, Ring said. She was about four, and she got to pick out a princess toothbrush, and you would have thought that she was in a toy store getting everything she wanted. And it was just it gave me a new perspective on things.The fire department has also opened its showers to residents who dont have running water. Danner said just being able to take a hot shower is one of the things the community has appreciated the most. She agrees that the little things have made some of the biggest impacts. It’s totally been all about the little things, she said. Things that we don’t think about on a day-to-day basis, that you don’t realize until you’ve gone four, five, six, eight, 10 days without it.The fire department says it will be winding down its supply distributions this weekend so it can go back to fire operations. It says it will take leftover supplies to other donation centers, such as local churches, and continue to help with recovery efforts. Bouboulis said the road to recovery for Todd and the rest of the region will be a long one. He hopes people will continue to support the area, and help by bringing tourism back. Every now and then, think about the mountains and come back up for a visit, he said.Ring said shes been touched by seeing neighbors help neighbors. She hopes the relationships made during this hard time will continue into the good times as the community returns back to normal.I just hope people realize that this doesn’t have to stop the caring for each other, the little things putting a smile on your face, she said. I hope people can just realize that needs to continue, especially in today’s world.Learn more about Todd Volunteer Fire Departments storm relief efforts by clicking here.NAVIGATE: Home | Weather | Watch NOWCAST TV | Local News | National | News We Love | Trending Stories

Hurricane Milton disrupts Yom Kippur plans for Jews in Florida [Video]
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Hurricane Milton disrupts Yom Kippur plans for Jews in Florida [Video]

Many Jews worldwide will mark Yom Kippur in fasting and prayer at their synagogues this weekend.Video above: Federal teams assessing damage caused by Hurricane MiltonBut for the faithful in Florida, destructive Hurricane Milton has disrupted plans for observing the Day of Atonement the holiest day of the year in the Jewish faith that begins Friday evening and caps off the High Holy Days that began with Rosh Hashana on Oct. 2.Across the storm-threatened areas, rabbis and their congregants spent part of the Days of Awe the span between Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur protecting their homes and synagogues as Milton churned off the coast, spiraling into a Category 5 storm. Many though not all evacuated, heeding the voluntary and mandatory orders, and found safekeeping for their synagogues’ Torah scrolls and themselves.Milton hit Florida’s Gulf Coast on Wednesday as a Category 3 cyclone, with damaging winds, heavy rains and tornadoes. By Thursday, the storm has moved eastward into the Atlantic Ocean.Why this Chabad rabbi decided against evacuating before the stormRabbi Yitzchok Minkowicz evacuated most of his family ahead of the storm, but chose to ride it out with his son, also a rabbi, at Chabad Lubavitch of Southwest Florida near Fort Myers. The center is hosting people displaced by the storm, including doctors, first responders and elderly who cannot evacuate.It’s important to be “with the people and for the people,” and provide emotional and spiritual support, he said as the storm approached.Near midnight Thursday, the Chabad center and the rest of the neighborhood lost power, said Minkowicz, making them among the millions without it. The center was spared from the storm surge, but homes and other buildings in the area were not, he said.”Our pressing need is for Power so that we can help our community & hold Yom Kippur services,” Minkowicz told The Associated Press via email Thursday. “We’re praying for this to be resolved asap.”The center planned to host Yom Kippur observances regardless of the storm. He said it was similar two years ago, when the holy day followed the major hurricane, Ian.”Yom Kippur is a day that you open up your soul to God and you totally connect with God,” Minkowicz said. “When you go through a hurricane, anything materialistic is not important. They’re already in that zone where they’re totally focused on God.”Congregation Beth Am in the Tampa Bay area also lost power and plans to hold Yom Kippur services online, said Rabbi Jason Rosenberg of the Reform synagogue.”It’s important to keep perspective. Having a service online is not what anybody wants, but it could’ve been a lot worse,” he said. “This feels like a blessing.”The storm underscored one of Yom Kippur’s annual reflections.An implicit question, he said before Milton’s landfall, is “If this was going to be your last year on earth, how would you want to act differently? … When you’ve got a historical storm, a potentially life-threatening and life-altering storm bearing down on you, that message is really present.”Milton disrupts Yom Kippur and Oct. 7 commemorationLike most of her congregants, Rabbi Nicole Luna had evacuated after helping secure Temple Beth El in Fort Myers and entrusting several Torah scrolls to congregants should the threatened surge devastate the synagogue.While the congregation braved Hurricanes Irma in 2017 and Ian in 2022, Milton’s timing hit especially hard, having already forced the postponement of a community-wide commemoration of Hamas attacking Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. The war that followed is ongoing.”It just feels like too much for our hearts to carry right now,” Luna said from Miami ahead of the storm. “It’s all very heavy.”Should the damage be less catastrophic than expected and the roads passable, she hoped to hold a small in-person gathering Yom Kippur on Saturday, when the holy day ends at sundown. If the power is on and it’s safe to return, she also might do a streamed service from the synagogue Friday evening.Luna said she is grateful for the “big outpouring of support” she received from fellow rabbis across the East Coast of Florida, who were opening their temples for the holidays to evacuees and have emphasized they can come as they are since few grabbed “holiday-appropriate clothing” in the rush to escape Milton’s fury.The Chabad of Southwest Broward near Fort Lauderdale is hosting several evacuees from areas most affected by the storm, ranging from a mother with her newborn to an elderly couple, said director Rabbi Pinny Andrusier. They are invited to spend Yom Kippur with the Cooper City-based group, including sharing kosher meals before and after the day of fasting.”We were spared, thank God,” Andrusier said of the storm. “We’ve been able to open up our doors” for those in the hurricane zone.For the first time in its history, barrier island synagogue skips holding Yom Kippur servicesHundreds of Jewish families on Longboat Key, a barrier island off Sarasota Bay, won’t be able to observe Yom Kippur in their synagogue for the very first time in their 45-year history, said Shepard Englander, CEO of The Jewish Federation of Sarasota-Manatee.Access to the island, specifically the John Ringling Causeway, was closed ahead of the storm. The congregation decided it wasn’t worth risking Milton’s might for Day of Atonement services. They had celebrated Rosh Hashana in their building despite a number of nearby homes being damaged by Hurricane Helene, which made landfall last month.Englander said he and his family evacuated from their home on a riverbank outside Sarasota and were hunkered down at a friend’s home inland. From there, he was trying to make sure community members from Longboat Key and other temples that won’t have services can say their prayers and break their daylong Yom Kippur fast at a newly constructed conference center in Sarasota with food items like blintzes, bagels, cream cheese and smoked salmon.Ahead of the storm, people were scattered in the region at emergency shelters or staying with family or friends, Englander said”It’s in difficult times that you really understand the power of community,” he said. “And this is a caring, tight-knit, generous Jewish community.”