One family in North Carolina is grieving the tremendous loss of 11 family members, while many others are starting the difficult and emotionally draining process of reconstructing their lives following Hurricane Helene’s catastrophic effects.
In Fairview, North Carolina, affectionately known by the residents as “Craigtown,” the Craig Family created eight decades’ worth of memories, according to WTVD. The state is now home to more than 100 fatalities after Hurricane Helene destroyed more than 500 miles in 48 hours, spanning from Florida to the Southern Appalachians.
Helene produced a mudslide that tore through Craigtown, eliminating multiple homes and killing the occupants.
According to WLOS, several of the family members were left to watch helplessly as water and muck destroyed the homes.
Losing anybody you love is difficult enough, but grieving the deaths of 11 people at once has left Jesse and Bryan Craig, the remaining family members, unable to identify their hometown while they cope with their loss.
Jesse Craig totaled the people he has lost.
About the mudslide, Bryan Craig stated, “They saw it, witnessed it, and had to watch it all, and just the sheer, the water through the trees, the rocks, the mud, it’s incredible.”
Bryan informed the channel that the family had celebrated a wedding together just one week before to the tragic event. With the help of the only items that survived the mudslide and pictures, loved ones are now left to search through the debris of what’s left of their families’ homes, recalling only their memories.
“We’re going to have some really great pictures from that wedding and pictures of people who are no longer with us,” Bryan stated.
The Craigs were a “larger than life” family, according to friend Steve Runion, who told WRAL that they were “pillars of the community.”
“They would do anything for you,” he stated. “They really do have servants’ hearts. That’s the best way I could put it… They were just loving people.”
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The family members who are remaining in the area are concentrated on restoring what their ancestors toiled so diligently to construct starting in the middle of the 20th century.
According to the statement, family friends have set up a GoFundMe to help with burial costs, reconstruction costs, medical bills, and unemployment during the grieving process.
