If you live in, or have family or friends in western North Carolina, you know more than most what kind of devastation was wrought in that area by Hurricane Helene last week. And if you don't, the sheer scale of destruction was so severe, it's even made international news.
For anyone who's been wondering how Dale's Wheels Through Time Museum fared through the storm, Matt Walksler and the WTT folks are posting updates on their social media pages to let everyone know that they're OK, and how things are going. The museum, which is located in Maggie Valley, North Carolina, is closed and will remain so for a bit as the area gets back on its feet.
As Walksler said in a video posted on Instagram, all the WTT staff and their families are safe and OK. Also, the Museum, rather miraculously, managed to not flood, and all the historic bikes and cars inside are OK. A bunch of the grounds outside are flooded and torn up, but overall they feel like they didn't get hit nearly as hard as some in the surrounding area did.
Infrastructure in the surrounding area was seriously impacted, though. That includes roads, power, internet, and more. In a separate post on the Museum's YouTube page, it wrote that "The fall season is one of the busiest times of the year for tourism-related businesses in Western North Carolina, and without the steady stream of visitors, many businesses will feel the impact. As our way of helping our community, we will donate a portion of all online proceeds during the month of October to local flood relief efforts."
If you want to support both the Wheels Through Time Museum and the surrounding community, you can do so on its webpage here. The Musuem also suggests going to Haywoodstrong.com to support the county. Legal Aid of North Carolina also has a webpage set up to both aid NC residents impacted by Helene, as well as direct folks who want to help on volunteer and donation resources.
