Army National Guard travels from coast to help Laurens County

LAURENS COUNTY, S.C. (FOX Carolina) – The Army National Guard traveled from the coast to the Upstate to help a community ravaged by Hurricane Helene.

They’re giving out MRE food rations and flats of water to hundreds of people impacted by the storm in Laurens County.

Teresa Cook-McGrath waited in line to pick up food and water. She said the local stores have been wiped out.

“Grocery stores are empty,” Teresa said. “It’s a scary situation.”

As wind and rain barreled into Laurens County early Friday morning, Teresa could hear trees destruction happening all around her.

Century-old trees were snapped in half and power lines dangled from utility poles outside her home.

Teresa and her family are among thousands in Laurens County who have been without power for more than 100 hours.

Neighbors said the county-wide outages have made it difficult to find food, as many local stores lost their refrigerated and frozen items.

With power outages persisting, people have rushed to buy up most of the remaining food supplies and water.

“Cold goods, the things that people need—meat, nutrition, vegetables and stuff—all this stuff is gone. We can’t get stuff. There’s no food,” Teresa said.

On Wednesday, more than half of the county remained in the dark. As of 8:00 p.m., Laurens Electric and Duke Energy reported nearly 34,000 combined outages.

With close to 25,000 customers who are currently without power, Laurens Electric said it could take several more days for crews to restore service to everyone.

“In my 35 years of experience, I have never seen this type of weather event cause this much damage,” Laurens County Fire Department Director of Fire Services, Greg Lindley said.

Across the county, the damage is extensive. However, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, or FEMA, has yet to classify Laurens County as a federal disaster area. FEMA officials arrived on Wednesday to assess the damage.

“People are without. To me, that’s destruction. I think FEMA needs to look a little closer, not just in the big cities, but in these small areas where we stay. People right now are struggling, and they’re getting frustrated.”

The Army National Guard has opened two distribution sites where residents can pickup essential supplies like water, MREs, and tarps:

• 105 Bolt Drive in Laurens
• 600 Peachtree Street in Clinton

Both locations are open from 10:00 a.m. until 7:00 p.m.

In addition, the county has set up an emergency shelter located at 301 Exchange Drive in Laurens.

Residents can report property damage here.

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