00:00Safely tucked underneath that blue tarp is Jennifer Grant's entire world.
00:05Her three dogs and two cats are warm inside, protected from bitter cold
00:10temperatures and a biting wind as Jennifer gets ready to spend another
00:14night sleeping in her car after Helene destroyed the only home she knew.
00:18There's days that I cry, but I try to stay even more happy. There's people that watch
00:22their parents and their nephew leave, you know, in the river and they died, you
00:26know, like I didn't have any of that. Jennifer lived in Beacon Village, a
00:30historic neighborhood in Swannanoa, North Carolina, that has been literally wiped
00:34off the map. Driving into Swannanoa, it's hard to find much progress along the
00:39main road that now defines what a hurricane-ravaged town looks like in the
00:44Blue Ridge Mountains. Nearly three months later, almost everything is still buried
00:48in mud. There were nearly 75 homes in this community alone. Now, less than a
00:54dozen still stand, but are completely uninhabitable. Volunteers are still
00:59donating their time in this part of western North Carolina, but those numbers
01:02are starting to dwindle as time marches on. There are supplies from all over
01:07North Carolina, South Carolina, and all across the country. They're stacked up in
01:12these tents, but the people that need them don't have any homes to put them in.
01:16I do know people who have died and people who have pretty much lost
01:20everything. People that need things are people that need their houses rebuilt
01:23so far. New construction is almost unheard of in these parts of Swannanoa.
01:28People come from Tennessee, Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia, people coming
01:32from everywhere just bringing blankets and trying to help. Jennifer's home rests
01:36on four good tires and the goodwill of total strangers. Her resiliency and
01:41determination, a bright silver lining. In a dark cloud, she's had to weather since
01:47Helene came to town. For AccuWeather, I'm Leslie Hudson reporting.
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