‘We just felt called’: Local volunteers travel to North Carolina to help with hurricane devastation

LACEY LAKEVIEW, Texas (KWTX) – A local group is now sharing their stories from eastern North Carolina after recently driving up to help people rebuild their lives after the devastation of Hurricane Helene.

Charles Fisher, the pastor at New Vision Family Fellowship, says when he saw what was happening in North Carolina he knew he had to do something.

“We just felt called… we saw it, my son called me on the phone and said, ‘dad what do you think about North Carolina’ and I said ‘I’m thinking about North Carolina’,” Charles shared.

And so, Charles, along with his son Caleb Fisher and Logan Selman, drove 18 hours to eastern North Carolina two weeks ago and stayed five days to help however they could.

But nothing could have prepared them for what they would see and the stories they would hear.

“You could see trees that were just layed over, brough from further up in the mountain down the river and… you know houses that had been basically demolished if not completely wiped off their foundations,” Selman explained.

Charles shared that “there was one family we heard of that lost 13 members of their family.”

While there they worked with the Red Truck Men, a nonprofit organization out of North Carolina, who sent them out wherever help was needed.

“A lot of tree removal, getting sometimes up to three feet of mud out of houses… we built a bridge,” Charles said.

But they say there’s still so much work to be done, and it will likely take years for North Carolina to recover from this.

“It’s not so much that they’re still in the shock of it, but there’s such a long road for them to recovery because they don’t have the same resources, they don’t have the houses that are built for that,” Caleb explained.

According to Caleb, what they need most right now is volunteers.

“They need manpower, they need machines, heavy equipment, even smaller sized heavy equipment… they need volunteers like crazy,” he said.

They also still need donations, such as “water bottles, buddy burners, monetary,” Caleb explained, “and especially prayers for everybody there.”

Caleb himself will soon be headed back to North Carolina with his family and their camper to continue their work.

“If that’s for three weeks, three months, three years… either we’re going to run out of work or we’re going to run out of money,” Caleb shared.

To sign up to volunteer or make monetary donations you can visit the Red Truck Men website.

They also need physical donations such as bottled water, green propane tanks, buddy heaters, and hand warmers. Those can be brought to the New Vision Family Fellowship at 665 New Dallas Hwy, Waco, TX, 76705.

Monetary donations for Caleb Fisher while he continues missionary work in the field can be sent through Venmo at Caleb-Fisher-17, Cashapp at $cowboymonney, or checks made out to New Vision Family Fellowship.

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