Join Us in Making a Difference
Hurricane Helene Relief and Restoration in Swannanoa, NC
Help us restore our community.
Beacon village Community updates, July 14, 2025
Three Families are Back in their Homes!
Yesterday, the third family moved back into their homes on a street on which 29 houses were unlivable after the storm. Our community is so excited to see the progress on the street. There are another four houses that we hope families can move back into in the next two months. Progress depends on the availability of materials, volunteer labor, and funds to cover the cost of the plumbers and electricians.
Next Steps
Work in Beacon Village is incremental. There are still a few houses on Edwards Avenue that have yet to begin reconstruction. Other houses are waiting for volunteers with the right skill set for their particular needs. There are also still many occupied homes in both upper and lower Beacon Village that have major damage and we are not able to address their needs (yet), and there are many houses that we hear about through the grapevine, but the homeowners feel there are others in the village with greater needs so they are not contacting us. We are working to find everyone in the village who needs assistance and ensure that all Beacon Village residents have a safe home with no residual damage form Hurricane Helene.
Beacon Village has qualified for a grant to hire a marketing and community development coordinator, and we are seeking candidates for this position which must be filled by a person displaced from their job by the storm. This coordinator will work full-time to ensure we know all members of our community who need assistance, coordinate volunteers, and manage our social media.
Volunteer Opportunities
- We need skilled carpenters to work on reframing the interiors of houses.
- We need skilled labor to help remove chimneys and fireplaces that haven't been in use for decades so that we can rebuild the interior of the homes.
- We need many truckloads of fill dirt and skid steers (with drivers) to replace and regrade 12 back yards that were washed away.
- Once the backyards are graded, we need trees to plant behind the houses to provide a buffer between the yards and the four lane road behind the houses. We also need landscaping in front of homes.
- We need 200 yards of drainpipes to be replaced from two gutters on the street to the culverts. Our 100 year old storm water drainage system is full of mud and has collapsed under ground.
- We need cleanup and reinforcement of mountain stream and creek beds that were washed away and continue to erode, threatening buildings close to them.
- We need to mitigate a chronic water problem behind eight houses that was severely exacerbated by the storm. A creek that flooded in heavy rains is now constantly flooding these back yards and threatening crawl spaces. We have a temporary fix with a portable sump pump in one yard, but need stream management on a larger scale to address this problem.
- We will need construction materials for quite some time.
If you can help with any of these items, please send us a note through the contact form at the bottom of this page.
Donate
Donations through the GoFundMe page are distributed directly to residents to assist with rent in temporary homes as people are also paying for the mortgages on homes in which they cannot live. We are still waiting for approval of our non-profit status, and for now tax deductible donations can be made through Calvary Church. These donations will be used for reconstruction. Donations of gift cards can be mailed to Calvary Church and will be distributed to residents.
About Save Beacon Village
Our Story
The goal of Save Beacon Village is to rebuild homes flooded in Hurricane Helene, beginning with the street you see in these photos on which houses were submerged - water over the gutters and neighbors rescued from roofs. This community is not is a flood plain and is a four hour drive from the closest ocean. Residents did not have flood insurance and never expected their homes to be destroyed by a hurricane.
Please check back with us regularly. We will post updates as we get the houses dried out and restored and as we work to establish a 501(c)3 organization to distribute funds from our GOFUNDME page and other resources directly to the residents.
What is Beacon Village?
Beacon Village is a quiet, quaint neighborhood of mill houses in Swannanoa, NC that was devastated by Hurricane Helene on Friday, September 27, 2024. The village was originally built by Beacon Blanket Manufacturing in the late1920's. Beacon was once the largest blanket manufacturer in the world and today many Beacon blankets are collector’s items. Beacon transformed Swannanoa into a mill town with company-owned houses and company-sponsored entertainment and sports teams. Beacon supplied blankets to the US military in World War II and were in many households in the US until 2002 when the mill closed and then burned down in 2023. Several homes are still owned by families who purchased them from Beacon, and new families have moved in over the years. Recent years have had much renovation and revitalization in these houses.
Thank you Swannanoa Valley Museum for this information!
Before and After
