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As the cleanup and recovery efforts from Hurricane Helene continue across western North Carolina, authorities continue to find the bodies of people who didn't survive the massive storm, which drenched the region in flooding rains and left over 230 people dead across several states.
One man is mourning the loss of 11 family members who were killed by a mudslide in the Asheville suburb of Fairview. Jesse Craig told WTVD that his family lived in the town for over 80 years, noting that many people referred to Fairview as "Craigtown."
On the morning of September 27, a massive mudslide wiped out most of Fairview.
"It's unrecognizable now, but this is where I was born and raised," Craig told the news station. "My mother and father, my aunt and uncle, my great aunt and uncle -- I've lost cousins, second cousins, things like that, but 11 people overall from this mudslide," he added.
"We'll never make sense of it. You know, it's our community and our town. I don't -- I don't know that it'll ever be the same," Jesse's wife MeKenzie said. "It's been that life-altering a situation."
The Craigs said they plan to rebuild everything that was destroyed by Helene.
"We don't want people to forget months down the road. This isn't just a week or two fix. We have to be in it for the long haul; this is going to take years of work to repair to have it recognizable again," MeKenzie said.