One Year Later: The Devastating February Floods

One year ago today, February 15 changed everything for McDowell County.

I still remember the first drives into the southern coalfields. Mudslides narrowly cleared and roadways crumbling beneath our tires. Bridges washed away or barely holding. Holler roads washed so badly you could miss entire communities if you did not know where to look. I remember my chest tightening the deeper we drove.

Over the past year I have walked through homes with families, helping as they pulled their lives out of mud filled rooms. I have hugged women crying on their front steps. I have shoveled through basements where fuel and septic water mixed into something dangerous to breathe. I have knocked on door after door and heard the same sentence over and over: "You are the first person to stop and check on us."

One year later, that reality still sits heavy. It weighs on my mind like an immovable mountain of stories not mine to tell.

If you have followed my posts, you know this work became personal very quickly. McDowell is where my people are from. In Panther, almost every door we knocked on knew my family. My grandmother once ran a store there. In Iaeger, mother's my side brought the first cable tv company. My family was once a part of the heartbeat of McDowell and the people there are not strangers to me. These are neighbors with shared roots and long memories. And what I witnessed this year was both heartbreaking and deeply inspiring.

I saw fathers wading through chest deep water to reach their families. I met a 67 year old man carrying rocks by hand to rebuild access to two stranded homes. I watched volunteers cook meals while their own properties still sat damaged. I met teachers ready to walk miles beyond road closures just to reach their students. The people of McDowell were never lacking in strength. They were lacking in support.

But I also need to say something from the heart. Over the past year, I have met some of the best, most selfless people I have ever known. I have built friendships and connections through this work that I will carry with me for the rest of my life. In the middle of devastation, there was also community. There was generosity. There were people who showed up again and again simply because someone needed them.

Time and time again, it was local business owners, small ministries, and determined volunteers who filled the gaps when help was slow to reach the hollers. Rebecca and Elliott Godfrey faithfully serve the southern portion of the county. It is something they started long before that horrible day and still continue after the headlines have faded. Many knew them first through their baby pantry work, but their mission has grown. Today, through Kingdom Kids Mission, they remain boots on the ground, meeting real needs for families who are still trying to stabilize.

Roberto and Sarah Diaz have done the same. Many were first introduced to the Diaz family through the tens of thousands of meals that reached even the most remote communities after the flood. I wall always refer to the "Taco Man" as "The Man that Fed McDowell." That work did not stop when attention moved on. They continue feeding families through their Nehemiah Project with the same steady commitment they showed in those earliest days.

As weeks passed after the flood, a group from Morgantown Mutual Aid made the long trip down to McDowell County multiple times to lend their hands and hearts. They worked tirelessly from morning until dark, mucking out basements, clearing debris, and hauling ruined possessions from homes that had been submerged in floodwaters. These volunteers came not for recognition, but to show up where help was most needed, often navigating treacherous roads and unstable terrain just to reach the hardest-hit areas. Their energy and determination left a lasting impact not only on the homes they restored, but on the spirits of the families who had been waiting weeks, sometimes months, for relief.

There are homes still in various stages of repair.

There are elderly neighbors who never physically recovered from the cleanup.

There are communities whose infrastructure was fragile long before the water ever rose.

I need to say something plainly. The flood will come again. Living in these mountains means we understand that truth. Heavy rain will fall. Rivers will rise. Hollers will fill. But what cannot happen again is what we witnessed in 2025. Communities should not be three, four, even ten weeks out still telling volunteers they were the first to check on them. Elderly residents should not be living in hazardous homes while waiting on systems that move too slowly to meet real world need. Small unincorporated communities should not feel invisible in the aftermath of a disaster.

2025 was unacceptable.

We must demand better preparation, stronger infrastructure, and coordinated response at every level of government because resilience should not mean being left to figure it out alone. McDowell County citizens have proven their strength a hundred times over this past year. The people are, as someone once described to me, a Swiss Army knife. They adapt. They endure. They show up for one another again and again.

But they should not have to carry this alone next time.

Please continue to support the organizations still doing the work on the ground. Please continue to share these stories. And please do not forget the families who are still rebuilding one year later.

The water may have receded but the recovery is still very real.