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How did wildlife and feral cats fare after Helene? Tell me again why we’re boiling water? Arts grants MIA? • Asheville Watchdog

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avlwatchdog.org – JOHN BOYLE – 2024-11-05 06:00:00

Today’s round of questions, my smart-aleck replies and the real answers:

Question: In your Helene reportage, will you address the impact the storm made on wildlife —  bears in their dens, small land animals unable to climb trees, etc.? While I know some organizations found cats, there hasn’t been any mention of how all these animals fared.

My answer: If any critters can survive an ecological apocalypse, I’d put my money on feral cats. OK, maybe my dogs because they’d be asleep on the couch.

Real answer: The main message from the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission is that it’s going to be assessing this for a long time. But here are some of the highlights from various WRC staffers, starting with spokesperson Anna Gurney, who compiled this information for me.

“It will likely be some time before the damage to WRC infrastructure is known, but the Armstrong State Fish Hatchery in Marion was severely damaged, and staff from that facility had to be evacuated by helicopter,” Gurney said. “All 600,000 trout were lost. Fall Delayed Harvest trout stockings have been suspended until staff can assess damage to facilities and delayed harvest stream locations.”

Restocking may start this month, depending on staffing, Gurney said.

“All other hatchery facilities received minimal damage and have resumed normal operations,” she added.

Regarding bears, Colleen Olfenbuttel, a black bear and furbearer biologist with the commission, had good news.

“Bears are resilient and can easily escape flood water and the storm,” Olfenbuttel said. “We also had six rehabbed bear cubs on the ground with GPS collars, and while they were not right in the ‘impact’ zone of Asheville, they are all alive and well. Based on their locations, they settled down during the storm and are now on the move again.”

The news was not so great for hellbenders, the large amphibians that live in our mountain streams and rivers. They’re unusual critters with a flat head and a paddle-like tail.

“Initial reports are that hellbenders appear to have taken a major hit across multiple counties and watersheds,” said Lori Williams, a biologist and hellbender expert with the WRC. “People are reporting finding them hundreds of feet away from rivers, stuck in mud ditches, piles of storm debris, and washed out in open fields.” 

A lot of dead ones have been uncovered in storm cleanup. 

“Immediately after the storm, there were some still alive that good-hearted folks put back in rivers,” Williams said. They’ve received reports about displaced hellbenders from Transylvania, Avery, Watauga and Ashe counties.

Williams said the population assessment will take time because so many rivers sustained such heavy damage.

“We anticipate habitat damage and/destruction in most watersheds, meaning loss and displacement of shelter rocks, nest rocks, and nests themselves, which would have had eggs soon to hatch this time of year,” Williams said.

She expects more damage to surface in the coming weeks. Here in Buncombe, Williams noted that the population of hellbenders in the Swannanoa River was “barely hanging on before Helene.

“Seeing what happened to that river now, are any hellbenders left in there at all?” Williams said. “Would be a low chance, in my opinion.”

Eastern Hellbenders are listed as a “state species of special concern.” They have small, isolated populations in a limited number of creeks in the state, biologists say.

Biologists say they’ll  have to start from scratch in the hardest-hit rivers, and then do more in-depth monitoring in the coming months and years.

Miranda Turner, a WRC wildlife health biologist in the Game and Furbearer program, said wildlife can be affected in numerous ways when a large storm like Helene hits.

During the storm, rising waters likely displaced animals from dens and nests, especially in low-lying areas. 

High winds caused birds and bats to alter their flying behavior to seek shelter, which affects foraging. Aquatic animals may have to go to new areas to seek shelter.

“Many species of birds were migrating in late September when the hurricane hit, and as a result biologists have found birds blown far off their typical migratory paths and species are being found in atypical locations — such as birds that are usually only found over the ocean being spotted inland,” Turner said.

Turner also noted that all the debris that’s washed up on creek and river banks will likely cause water quality issues for months. Pollution could also have long-term effects.

I’ll note that in a recent Buncombe County daily briefing, French Broad Riverkeeper Hartwell Carson, who works for the nonprofit MountainTrue, said he had not seen any large fish kills along the French Broad.

The loss of human-made infrastructure from Tropical Storm Helene, particularly bridges, has displaced
// Photo credit: North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission

Turner pointed out one possible impact I hadn’t really thought about — the loss of human-made infrastructure. You may think it would be a positive to remove this, but “in reality many wildlife species use human-made structures extensively and have been displaced from their homes by the loss of these structures,” Turner said.

“Western North Carolina is known to have many species of bats that roost in bridges, including federally endangered gray bats,” Turner said. “With the loss of multiple bridges due to flooding, it is unknown whether these roosts and bats survived the storm, and it will take many months for the infrastructure in the area to improve enough that biologists will be able to access these areas to check on the bat populations.”

She noted other threatened or endangered species, such as the southern bog turtle, Hickory Nut Gorge green salamander, and the Carolina northern flying squirrel, that the commission will not be able to assess until infrastructure improves.

All of the storm disturbance could contribute to disease outbreaks in wildlife.

“Animals such as black bears, raccoons, skunks, and opossums are already taking advantage of the plentiful trash and rotting food to forage in urban areas more than they had been prior to the storm,” Turner said. “When many animals congregate in small areas, the potential for a disease outbreak is much greater.”

Also, standing water after the flood raises the risk for vector-borne illnesses spreading in wildlife, such as West Nile virus transmitted by mosquitoes.

“NCWRC staff will be carefully monitoring for the spread of any diseases in the wildlife in the Hurricane Helene impacted areas during the upcoming months, and currently there have been no unusual signs of disease in the area,” Turner said.

The commission on Oct. 4 noted in a news release that it was receiving reports of an increase in human-black bear interactions in Asheville and Buncombe County, in part because of more trash in area, unattended food donations, and “the attractiveness of rotting foods, particularly in damaged homes and businesses.”

Regarding feral cats, the Asheville Humane Society told me that’s not something it tracks and referred me to Sister Kitten Animal Rescue in Maggie Valley. Executive Director Eric Phelps said their impression is that it’s sort of a mixed bag — undoubtedly, some cats got caught off guard by the quickly rising waters and drowned, but they’ve also found quite a few survivors in unexpected places.

He noted that feral cat colonies are “pretty ubiquitous all over the area.

“And we had several colonies that we feed over in the River Arts District, actually right by Asheville Paper Company, which got completely wiped out,” Phelps told me. “There’s about a dozen cats there that we’ve been feeding the last few years, and we had no idea if they were able to survive or not.”

They had guessed they got wiped out because cats tend to look to climb trees or other objects when faced with rising waters, and there was really nowhere to go when the French Broad rose out of its banks.

“Once the water receded enough, we got over there to the location where we had been feeding previously, and we started feeding again,” Phelps said. “Finally, we got a game camera up a couple of weeks ago, and we’re seeing about half the colony has returned, which is pretty striking, because some of these cats are elderly.”

With the lack of trees to climb, Phelps isn’t sure how they made it.

“They must have run like hell to get away from the water,” he said.

Further north in the RAD, a woman feeds a couple of colonies, maybe a dozen cats total, near the Jeff Bowen Bridge, Phelps said.

“And all of her cats returned — all of them,” Phelps said. “She got them all back, even the ones under the bridge that were at water level. Those cats apparently got away from the water. And once she was able to start feeding over there again, they all came back.”

In other places, though, particularly mobile home parks, Phelps said the loss of life was probably more significant, as feral cats facing flood waters will often climb up underneath the homes seeking shelter. 

He said his organization also has been searching for owned pets, and he got a hit on a game camera for a woman’s pet cat in Swannanoa recently. That cat lived in a home that flooded to the roof line, Phelps said, adding that the cat had been distinctively groomed before the storm so he’s pretty certain it’s the right animal.

“She hasn’t been back in the neighborhood, but now she’s back, moving around in the neighborhood, looking for food or trying to find her mom,” Phelps said. “It’s taken over a month for her to come back. So I guess the message there is, don’t give up hope.”

Equipment used to install turbidity-reducing curtains sits on the shore of North Lake Reservoir. Asheville water system customers are under a boil water notice more than a month after Helene. // Credit: City of Asheville

Question: I’ve gotten quite a few questions from readers about the City of Asheville’s boil water notice, which remains in effect. I’ll summarize: If the city is super-chlorinating the water it’s sending out from the North Fork Reservoir, that should kill pathogens. So what good does heating up the water to the boiling point do? Isn’t that just boiling the clay and other minerals in the water without getting rid of them?

My answer: In my book, nothing tastes finer than a nice cup of hot clay water with just the right dash of aluminum sulfate for smoothness.

Real answer: I posed this question to Asheville Water Resources Department spokesperson Clay Chandler at the Buncombe County Helene briefing Monday.

“So that’s to eliminate any bacteria that may be in the water by the time it reaches your tap,” Chandler said. “Boiling water is going to kill bacteria. It’s not going to reduce the level of things like chlorine, aluminum, iron and manganese. It’s specifically designed to kill things like E coli and coliform, none of which we’ve had a positive for in the distribution system, by the way, since we’ve been testing.”

The city still recommends using bottled water for consumption and using tap water for non-consumption uses such as showering and flushing toilets. The upshot is that you could drink the boiled water (boil for at least one minute), if you had no access to any other drinking water, but you’re better off drinking bottled water if you can get it.

“We are presenting every bit of information that we have, and if somebody is comfortable boiling the water and consuming it, that’s certainly up to them,” Chandler said. “Bottled water for consumption, or water from an alternate source for consumption is recommended if it’s available. If it’s not available — there’s just no way under the sun that somebody can get their hands on purified water — they can boil it for a minimum of one minute beforehand, before any kind of consumption.”

You can find an extensive list of frequently asked questions on the water department’s Helene recovery page, and that includes a lot of information about boiling water and the minerals currently in the water. Also, check out Asheville Watchdog’s most recent story about the city’s water restoration efforts.

Question: Explore Asheville has been saying for weeks that they will be distributing grants to local tourism-related businesses, but they’ve yet to “stand up” an application. Considering the amount of money they have access to, I’m wondering why it’s taking so long for them to do something for the businesses who’ve helped fund them.

My answer: Hey, I have no more luck getting Explore Asheville to answer questions than you do.

Real answer: Seriously, I really don’t. I sent this question over to Explore Asheville on Oct. 23 and got a few assurances they were working on it. Then they put out a news release Oct. 31 saying they’re now accepting applications for the Always Asheville Fund, which they established Oct. 9.

The fund will “support small, independent travel and hospitality businesses throughout Asheville and Buncombe County in reopening after the devastating impacts of Hurricane Helene. More than $750,000 will be available in microgrants ranging from $5,000 to $10,000.”

Explore Asheville is a subsidiary of the Buncombe County Tourism Development Authority, which has a $34 million budget this year. 

Asheville Watchdog is a nonprofit news team producing stories that matter to Asheville and Buncombe County. Got a question? Send it to John Boyle at jboyle@avlwatchdog.org or 828-337-0941. His Answer Man columns appear each Tuesday and Friday. The Watchdog’s reporting is made possible by donations from the community. To show your support for this vital public service go to avlwatchdog.org/support-our-publication/.

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Has pollution made local rivers a blue-green color? Mission and the VA Medical Center used their own water after city’s was restored? Who is Cowboy Dave? • Asheville Watchdog

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5 hours ago

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December 24, 2024

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avlwatchdog.org – JOHN BOYLE – 2024-12-24 06:00:00

Today’s round of questions, my smart-aleck replies and the real answers:

Question: My question is related to the waterways around western North Carolina and their health. I live near the Swannanoa River. The past few weeks the river has been a blue/green color. It’s almost glacial looking. Some are saying this color is a result of all the toxins from Hurricane Helene. Can you please weigh in? Is there active testing on our rivers like the French Broad, Swannanoa, etc?

My answer: I mean, beyond the pickup trucks, semi trailers, plastic pipes, broken trees and Dumpsters still lodged in the rivers, they seem pretty healthy.

Real answer: The experts I talked to agree that it’s most likely a natural phenomenon related to the flood, scouring of rocks and removal of waterway sediment, and not to pollutants.

Philip Prince, a geologist and adjunct professor at Virginia Tech University, has been studying Helene’s effects in western North Carolina. While he hasn’t specifically covered the water color issue, he has a theory why it’s happening.

First, he surmises that all of the work being done in and around the water channels continues to cause rocks to be ground up. The storm also scoured the rocks, creating a similar effect.

“If you take rock and you grind it up or joggle it around, that dust that you get, if it gets suspended in the water, it makes that color,” Prince said. “Which is why the comparison to a glacial (waterway) is probably pretty apt, because glacier movement over rock essentially does the same thing — it takes pieces of rock and it grinds them against each other, and it makes, basically, rock powder. And when that rock powder gets in the water, it will turn it sort of like a bright, milky blue or green.”

Helene rearranged the rocks in a lot of streams and rivers, which resulted in a lot of heavy equipment being used, sometimes in the streambeds, to rearrange them or even reroute the waterways some. 

The natural scouring effect that occurred during Helene also may play a role.

“The stream beds where they haven’t had an excavator drive around in them, they were really scoured by this event,” Prince said. “The rocks that were left, they normally have oxidation and scum on them, so they’re dark. Many rocks were just brilliant ghost white after this — it was literally like they got pressure washed.”

That can create a different reflection scenario.

“If the water is clear — if the water does not have a lot of suspended material in it — the sunlight coming down hitting that white rock on the river bottom and reflecting off and coming back up through the water, that will change the color of it,” Prince said. “That will make the water look different.”

It could also be somewhat of a combination of the two — brighter bottom rocks and some suspended rock dust that creates the colorization.

In some rivers in America, suspended limestone particles create a green-blue effect. But Prince said in our mountains there is “a near complete absence of limestone rocks around here, unless it’s brought in as crush.”

There is a limestone quarry in Fletcher, but that’s unusual. Most of the rock here is gneiss or schist, which are both very similar to granite.

Anna Alsobrook, the French Broad watershed science and policy manager at MountainTrue, an Asheville environmental nonprofit, said she has noticed the blue-green coloring. She surmises that the coloring is “due to all the scouring from the hurricane.”

“Flood waters moved tons of sediment, exposing more bedrock, and wiping it clean,” Alsobrook said. “So, maybe there’s more mineral deposition since there’s more contact with the actual rock (versus sediment), or maybe it’s more of a light reflection thing, since the light is bouncing off rock rather than sediment.”

Alsobrook said she doesn’t think “it has anything to do with any particular influx of pollutants in the waterways.”

Regarding those pollutants and testing, French Broad Riverkeeper Hartwell Carson, who also works at MountainTrue, told me the organization received another round of water and sediment samples from around the French Broad Watershed in mid-December.

In early October, the French Broad River in Marshall also was taking on a green hue.// Watchdog photo by John Boyle

Samples came from the Nolichucky River in Erwin, Tennessee; the Nolichucky downstream of Erwin; the Swannanoa River in Swannanoa and Biltmore Village; and the French Broad River at Westfeldt Park, Woodfin, Marshall and Hot Springs. They also tested Mud Creek downstream of Hendersonville and the North Toe River downstream of Spruce Pine.

“We found a variety of pollutants but feel encouraged about what we found and the levels of the pollutants,” Carson said, noting MountainTrue has analyzed the results with the help of other water experts. “We continue to find a host of metals in the samples, but for the most part these metals are not above background levels, are metals that are not very problematic to human health or the environment and are at fairly low levels.”

They did find “some pollutants with higher concerns around toxicity, such as trichloroethene (TCE), pyrene, and diesel range organics (a type of petroleum hydrocarbon). 

“Trichloroethene, or TCE, was found in the sediment at Charles D. Owen Park along the Swannanoa River in Swannanoa,” Carson said. “TCE is volatile, meaning it readily evaporates into the air at room temperature, where people can sometimes smell it.”

TCE is a solvent used to strip paint, remove grease from metal and spots from clothing.

“The results found in our sample were 7.19 micrograms per kilogram, which is much lower than most state regulatory limits,” Carson said.

Carson said pyrene, a natural component of coal tar, crude oil and fossil fuels, was found at 286 micrograms per kilogram in the Woodfin sediment sample along the French Broad River.

“The health effects of brief exposures to pyrene are unknown,” Carson said. “Longer-term animal studies show that pyrene can cause nephropathy (kidney disease) and decreased kidney weight. Based on the regulatory levels we studied, this level does not appear to be an alarming level.”

MountainTrue also found acetone in several samples, including from the Nolichucky downstream of Erwin, Swannanoa sediment at Charles D. Owen Park and Biltmore Village, and sediment samples from the French Broad in Marshall and Woodfin.

“Because of the low level of acetone found and toxicity of acetone, we aren’t terribly concerned about the exposure this pollutant presents,” Carson said.

MountainTrue also tested for the impact of any fuel remaining in flood waters or sediment.

“None of the samples we tested showed gasoline range organics, but five samples were present for diesel range organics,” Carson said, noting they were all in sediment samples. 

They were from these locations: the North Toe at Penland (5.7 milligrams per kilogram, or mg/kg), French Broad River at Woodfin (37.4 mg/kg), French Broad River in Marshall (16.9 mg/kg), the Swannanoa River at Charles D. Owen Park (69.7 mg/kg) and Biltmore Village (74 mg/kg).

“According to an N.C. State Extension article about diesel range organics in soil for gardening, these levels would be classified as low or moderate,” Carson said. 

Question: If Asheville City water has been deemed potable since Nov. 18, why as of late November/early December were Mission Hospital and the VA Medical Center still bringing in water in tanker trucks? Is there something that the hospitals know that the city hasn’t shared with everyone else?

My answer: I suspect the lead in the water was messing with the X-ray machines.

Real answer: Mission Hospital spokesperson Nancy Lindell explained the hospital’s decisions surrounding this issue.

After Helene damaged Asheville’s water supply and system, Mission Hospital brought in tankers to provide potable water to its patients and staff. // Watchdog photo by Keith Campbell

“After the City of Asheville lifted the boil water advisory, our team began the process of transitioning back to municipal water,” Lindell said in early December. “While we have continued to rely on the wells HCA Healthcare drilled in the storm’s aftermath and water brought in via tanker trucks, Mission Health conducted independent testing of the water at our sites within the City.”

Lindell said then that its test results “concur with the City of Asheville that the water is potable,” Lindell said. 

“As the tankers that have been supplying water for the past two months move out and municipal water is turned back on, there should be no noticeable effects for our patients, visitors or colleagues,” Lindell said. Mission resumed using city water the first week of December.

At the Charles George VA Medical Center, spokesperson Kathie Ramos said the facility went back on city water Dec. 16, as the VA received water quality testing results Dec. 13.

The VA had been using water tankers before that.

“Before the storm, our Facilities Management Services disconnected the campus’s 200,000-gallon water tank from the city water system as a precautionary measure,” Ramos said. “After Hurricane Helene, the municipal water system suffered severe damage, preventing the medical center from using city water immediately. Since our water system remained uncontaminated, we continued the water tanker operation to provide a safe and reliable water supply to our customers.”

Ramos said the VA prioritizes “meeting all federal water standards” before it transitioned back to municipal water.

“After the city declared the water safe for consumption, we implemented our plan to return to the municipal system, which includes flushing and testing the water,” Ramos said, noting that the hospital had sent out samples for water quality testing. “As a healthcare facility, we must follow this deliberate approach to safeguard the well-being of all our patients, staff, and visitors.”

Question: In front of the Shell station in Swannanoa, at the corner of Patton Cove Road and U.S. 70, a guy has been standing out there all day waving a cowboy hat and giving drivers a thumbs up. Who is this guy? And why is he doing this?

My answer: Clearly, his horse broke down and he needs help.

Real answer: This would be Cowboy Dave, whose full name is Dave Graham. He hails from Newark, Ohio, and travels the country offering support and a friendly wave of his white cowboy hat after natural disasters and other traumatic events.

Graham, 65, told me he’s been at this for more than 20 years, and he just wants to offer people a pleasant distraction and a kind word, whether they’re a truck driver, a volunteer or just a hardworking person with a tough job who’s on their way home.

“They deserve to be honored, so show honor where honor’s due,” Graham said. “So everybody gets a look in the eyes, right? And I let them know that they’re flipping important, because they are. How important is that?”

“Cowboy Dave” Graham talks with Hunter Preston, the chaplain at Givens Highland Farms Senior Community in Black Mountain, in front of the Shell station on U.S. 70. Cowboy Dave has taken up residence there following Helene, waving his cowboy hat as passersby and offering words of encouragement. // Watchdog photo by John Boyle

As I talked with Cowboy Dave last Tuesday evening, he gave just about every motorist a friendly wave of his hat, a thumbs up and maybe some encouraging words. Many responded with horn honks and thumbs ups of their own.

Initially after the storm, he said motorists were a little frosty, maybe suspecting he was up to something or looking for money. He’s not — Graham and his wife actually operate a nonprofit, heartshurt.com, that offers support to those in need, and locally he’s been coordinating assistance for people hit by the storm, delivering fuel to campers and inviting people to share fellowship near his camper.

Now the reactions are much more positive.

“To get somebody to toot the horn or or do something other than wave, something audible — say, ‘Hello cowboy,’ or whatever — that was about one out of 60, and I count in all the directions,” Graham said. “Now it’s about one out of 20.”

As we were talking, Hunter Preston, the chaplain at Givens Highlands Farms in Black Mountain, stopped by to thank Cowboy Dave for praying with him that morning. The area has a real need for people who can work on donated trailers and campers to make sure they’re operational this winter, and Preston told Cowboy that after they prayed he got a solid lead on workers who can help.

“This is Christmas,” Preston said about what Cowboy Dave is doing. “Absolutely, this is Christmas.”

Preston said Graham’s work is not affiliated with a particular denomination or organization, and Graham’s not looking for glory.

“All the credit is going to the glory of God, because that’s the word of the Gospel. The Lord shows up for the most needy, the hurting, in the most broken places, for the woundedness,” Preston said. “And this is the kind of love that just continues to come into this area.”

He noted that Cowboy Dave plans to host folks under a nearby illuminated tree by the Shell station on Christmas Eve for a Bible reading.

Graham lit up like the tree at the mention of this.

“Christmas Eve day at noon, Cowboy will have the PA system out,” Graham said with a laugh. “People can pull in in their car, and it will be the Christmas story from Matthew and Luke.”

He’ll be doing that every two hours throughout the day, into 2 a.m. Christmas.

“And I’ve got 20 people committed to 2 a.m. Christmas morning who are gonna be here,” Graham said.

I might miss that one, Cowboy Dave, but Merry Christmas!

Asheville Watchdog is a nonprofit news team producing stories that matter to Asheville and Buncombe County. Got a question? Send it to John Boyle at jboyle@avlwatchdog.org or 828-337-0941. His Answer Man columns appear each Tuesday and Friday. The Watchdog’s reporting is made possible by donations from the community. To show your support for this vital public service go to avlwatchdog.org/support-our-publication/.

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‘Substantial evidence’ Gaetz paid for sex with minor, U.S. House Committee says • NC Newsline

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21 hours ago

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December 23, 2024

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ncnewsline.com – Ashley Murray – 2024-12-23 14:26:00

SUMMARY: A U.S. House Committee on Ethics report alleges that former Congressman Matt Gaetz, nominated by President-elect Donald Trump for attorney general, engaged in sex with a minor and committed other offenses. The 42-page report claims Gaetz regularly paid for sex, used illegal drugs, and obstructed investigations. It states he had sex with a 17-year-old girl in 2017, violating Florida’s statutory rape laws. Gaetz denies the allegations and has not faced criminal charges. He sued the committee, arguing its report lacked jurisdiction after his resignation. The committee debated the report’s release, with some members opposed to it.

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Trump chooses two-time congressional candidate Hines | North Carolina

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1 day ago

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December 23, 2024

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www.thecentersquare.com – By Alan Wooten | The Center Square – 2024-12-23 07:39:00

SUMMARY: President-elect Donald Trump has appointed Bo Hines as executive director of the Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets, also known as the Crypto Council. Hines, who was previously endorsed by Trump in his congressional bids, will work with David Sacks to foster growth in the digital assets industry. Hines, a former football player and Ivy League graduate, has run for Congress in North Carolina multiple times, with mixed results. His platform focused on issues like immigration reform, free speech, and election integrity. Hines also owns and operates several businesses.

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