After the storm passed, I got in my truck to head out of my neighborhood. But the entire neighborhood and the immediate road leading elsewhere were completely covered in fallen trees.
One finger road into my neighborhood was completely blocked off, but I could hear men with chain saws on the other side of the fallen trees cutting their way out.
By the end of the next day, all of these neighbors had managed not only to free themselves but also to clear a one-lane pathway through the adjoining neighborhoods and out to the interstate.
Western North Carolina has lost none of its independent and hardworking ethos. Rather than moan and wait on the government, people used their own equipment, their own gasoline and their own sweat to address a serious situation.
— Guy Smith
Asheville
