Rescue missions after the Helene flood include dozens stranded on the roof of a Tennessee hospital Achi-News

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – As floodwaters from Hurricane Helene quickly surrounded a small Tennessee hospital near a riverfront, workers first tried to get patients out by ambulance. Then, the road washed out.

They tried to move people into the center of the building, but they were met by water.

Once rescue boats arrived, the water was so dangerous that they could not leave. Dozens of staff and patients eventually took to the roof to wait to be taken to safety, and a few others stayed in lifeboats, as winds whipped and brown waters lashed nearby with debris below them.

Within a few hours, they were all rescued.

The dramatic scene at Unicoi County Hospital, in Erwin, Tennessee, near the North Carolina border, was one of many that played out across the southern US in the wake of Helene. Flooding caused by its storm surge and rain sent thousands of police officers, firefighters, National Guard members and others on rescue missions. Hundreds were saved, but at least 40 died.

“It was just the grace of God that we had enough people to move people up to the roof,” Tennessee hospital administrator Jennifer Harrah told WJHL-TV. “And we were able to put the non-ambulatory patients in the boats and keep them safe and have medical personnel with the patients in the boats as well. And we got them in a corner, protected by two walls.”

Unicoi County Hospital tried to evacuate 11 patients and 43 others Friday morning after the Nolichucky River overflowed its banks and flooded the facility, but the water was too dangerous for boats dispatched by the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency.

The decision was made to direct more than 50 people to the roof. Another seven had been temporarily stranded in lifeboats. Ballad Health, which operates the small 10-bed hospital, asked for people’s prayers as it provided the social media update.

After other helicopters failed to reach the hospital due to the storm’s winds, the Virginia State Police helicopter was able to land on the roof. Three National Guard helicopters with lift capabilities were dispatched, officials said.

In a later post, Ballad Health said all staff and patients were rescued about four hours after dozens of them were moved to the roof of the hospital. Patients were transferred to a different facility and no one remained in hospital.

“Quite simply, the water there rose faster with more debris than was safe to operate in the rafts to transport it from a dry point back to the hospital,” said Patrick Sheehan, Tennessee’s director of emergency operations.

Meanwhile in Florida, the efforts of 1,500 search-and-rescue personnel will be focused on securing and stabilizing affected communities through the weekend, said Kevin Guthrie, the state’s director of emergency operations. A Category 4 storm made landfall on the Northwest Florida coast late Thursday, but it created flooding from a storm surge along the state’s Gulf Coast.

“As those kinds of rescue missions happen today, and continue, don’t go out and visit the affected areas,” Guthrie said at a news conference Friday in Florida’s capital, Tallahassee. “I’m begging you, don’t get in their way.”

The rescues reported ranged from life-threatening situations to people trapped in their homes by waist-high water and unable to escape on their own.

Five people in Pinellas County died and dozens were rescued after the storm surge hit an unprecedented 8 feet (2.4 meters), forcing some to seek shelter in their attics. Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said the deaths all occurred in neighborhoods where authorities told residents to evacuate, but many ignored the warnings.

He said survivors told deputies they didn’t believe the warnings after other residents told them the surge wouldn’t be that bad.

“We made our case. We told people what they needed to do, and they chose otherwise,” Gualtieri said.

Gualtieri said his deputies tried overnight to reach those who were trapped, but in some neighborhoods it was not safe. Pinellas County includes St. Petersburg.

“I was out there in person. We tried to launch boats, we tried to use high water vehicles and we met too many obstacles,” Gualtieri said. He said the death toll could rise as emergency crews went door to door in the flooded areas to see if anyone was left.

In neighboring Hillsborough County, which includes Tampa, the sheriff’s office rescued more than 300 people overnight from storm surge. Spokeswoman Amanda Granit said those included a 97-year-old woman with dementia and her 63-year-old daughter, who were surprised by the surge and needed help fleeing their flooded home; and a 19-year-old woman whose car got stuck while she was driving in the rising water and couldn’t get out.

Granit said deputies were carrying out such large rescues that they had to request county transit buses to get the people to safety.

“Deputies couldn’t move them in fast enough in their patrol vehicles,” Granit said.

In the city of South Pasadena in the Tampa Bay area, rescue video shows a house burning early Friday amid flooded streets. Other counties along the Gulf reported more than 100 rescues.

When water from the storm surge reached Kera O’Neil’s knees inside her home in Hudson, 45 miles north of Tampa, she knew she and her sister needed to flee with their two a cat

“There’s a moment where you think if this water rises above the level of the stove, we’re not going to have much room to breathe,” he said.

O’Neil and her sister went into chest-deep water with one cat in a plastic carrier and another in a cardboard box. They found shelter on a neighbor’s more elevated property before Pasco County firefighters on a raft rescued them and three others.

“I’m a Florida girl, and we’ve been here since we were kids,” she said. “We’ve never experienced anything like this.”

At sea, the Coast Guard said it rescued three boaters and their pets from the storm in separate incidents. In a helicopter rescue Thursday captured on Coast Guard video, a man and his Irish setter were stranded 25 miles offshore in the Gulf on their 36-foot yacht in heavy seas.

The video shows the man putting his dog in a yellow life vest and pushing it into the raging sea before jumping in himself. A Coastguard swimmer helped them into a rescue basket and they were lifted into the copter.

In North Carolina, more than 100 swift water rescues took place as Helene’s rains caused massive flooding on Friday, particularly in the western part of the state. Governor Roy Cooper said the flash floods threatened lives and created a number of landslides.

“The priority now is to save lives,” Cooper said, urging people to stay off the roads unless seeking higher ground.

“With the rain they were already experiencing before Helene arrived, this is one of the worst storms in modern history for parts of western North Carolina,” Cooper said.

In Georgia, Governor Brian Kemp said crews were working to rescue people trapped in more than 115 homes.

Helene’s rain flooded homes in Hanover West, a neighborhood in north Atlanta. Emergency personnel rescued several people from their homes, said Richard Simms, a resident of a nearby neighborhood.

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Spencer reported from Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Associated Press reporter Beatrice Dupuy contributed to this report.