The Southern Appalachians, about 400 miles north of where Helene came ashore, suffered the most severe destruction. Two waves of torrential rain unloaded as much as 30 inches in the mountains of North Carolina, unleashing catastrophic landslides while rivers soared to unprecedented levels and lakes overflowed.

Helene made landfall in Florida's Big Bend region Thursday night as a massive Category 4 hurricane -- the strongest hurricane to make landfall in the Big Bend on record.

Hurricane Helene, which left massive destruction along the Florida coast since making landfall Thursday, is now causing historic flooding, wide-ranging power outages, and other damage in an 800-mile northward path that's affecting the Carolinas,