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An American flag is on a table at the former Nichols Town Hall in South Carolina, showing the damage caused by the flood of Hurricane Matthew two years ago. Matthew has damaged or destroyed 90% of the houses here. (David Goldman / AP)
NICHOLS, S.C. – The wind shook the house, the rain did not stop and Glendale Gilchrist worried that it would happen again.
All she could think of was that day, two years ago, the last time a hurricane was shot down on the site. There was first the false sense of security. Then the six inches of water at his door, seemingly out of nowhere. And finally, the frantic orders of his daughter that they had to leave – now.
A few hours later, the voice of a television presenter indicated that the city she had called home for more than two decades was practically over.
So Gilchrist also left, one of the many people who abandoned this town of 400 – where Hurricane Matthew flooded almost every home and closed half of the shops. For about 20 months, she lived with her fiancé near North Myrtle Beach, slowly repairing her two-bedroom concrete house, until she finally returned in June.
About two months later, she looked nervously outside, with everything that seemed to be about to separate.
"I'm too old to start over," said Gilchrist, 64.
To begin again: in the small cities of America, it is more a question of reflection than a certainty to seize. When natural disasters strike powerful urban centers – such as Houston at Harvey or New York during Sandy – public resources and proclamations plague that the storm will only test the city's formidable resolve and the community will come back stronger that & # 39; before. But for small towns like Nichols, without resources or expertise in disaster recovery, there are only difficult and uncertain questions.
Will there be enough money to rebuild?
Who will come back?
And, the most existential of all, will it remain a city?
"The storm is wreaking havoc in our state," said North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper (D) on Friday. North Carolina, like South Carolina, faces challenges of poverty and small communities with few recovery resources. "And we are deeply concerned about farms, businesses, schools and entire communities that could be eliminated," said Cooper.
A house in Nichols is in the waters after Hurricane Matthew on October 10, 2016. (Rainier Ehrhardt / AP)
Almost all the recovery of small communities in the United States is more difficult. Residents are more likely to be poor or disabled and contribute less tax to local governments. They are relatively isolated and may lack the importance and political weight of their counterparts in large cities, which can facilitate the flow of funds. According to a dispatch from Moody's last year, after the disaster, the credit rating of the inhabitants of small towns is even higher.
"After Hurricane Harvey, we heard many small towns on the Texas coast that did not even know where to start getting help from the state and FEMA," said Shannon Van Zandt, professor at Texas A & M University studied disaster planning. "The impacts in big cities only hide what is happening in small communities. Interest and assistance only concern large cities and result in an inequitable distribution of resources. "
Lawson Battle, the gruff but thoughtful mayor of Nichols, had another word for it.
"Forgotten," he says.
That's how he felt in October 2016 after Matthew made his way with the Carolinas and his community. It flooded the nearby Little Pee Dee and Lumber Rivers, which in turn flooded the city with water feet that held there for days. Many people have chosen never to return – reconstruction was too expensive for the uninsured or too difficult for the most vulnerable – leaving room for their abandoned homes.
"We lost an entire city," said Battle. "We needed more help than we had. . . . One hundred percent flooded. The companies are gone.
And what would become of Nichols, who was declining even before Matthew, if such a disaster recurred? Friday, Florence dumped 10 to 20 inches of rain on North Carolina and had to spit 20 to 25 inches more. Much of this water would follow the water courses to South Carolina.
The result could be "catastrophic," said Battle, shaking his head and possibly fatal. "People will be reluctant to rebuild their homes twice in two years."
A pharmacy in Nichols remains in place nearly two years after being flooded by the rains of Hurricane Matthew. (David Goldman / AP)
They had already lost almost everything that made a city a city, he said: the bank, the pharmacy, the laundromat – even the post office which, after six months of neglect and expensive repairs, has finally reopened last year floors and walls repainted. It is the workplace of the mail and the unofficial mayor of the city, Pam Huggins, who spent 19 years as a smuggler and knew almost everyone. On Friday morning, while she was on the road to finish her 350 deliveries, her mobile phone was ringing all the time.
She stopped at the post office and turned off the vintage emergency lighting on her brown sedan. She rushed through the wind and rain on her side, then her phone lit up again.
"We have a long way to go," she said at the other end. "It's supposed to rain a lot more tonight than it is today. You are all safe now.
She hung up.
"They are very anxious," she told colleagues around her. "They do not know if they can get through this one. Bless his little heart.
Although cities like Nichols do not have the resources or profile of larger communities, they benefit from some intangibles – the presence of people like Huggins. Jerry T. Mitchell, a professor at the University of South Carolina, is their robust "social capital."
Stoney Williamson, right, unloads a generator for his brother-in-law, whose house was flooded two years ago during Hurricane Matthew, as shown by Harry Campbell on the left. (David Goldman / AP)
"There is evidence of a tougher community structure that can strengthen the resilience of rural populations, which may be harder to find in a diverse and disconnected urban population," he said in an email. "Isolation can help build resilience, as the population is used to" fend for themselves. "
But will this resilience save Nichols if Florence picks up where Matthew left off?
Huggins, preparing to close the post office, did not know. She wanted to hope, of course, but she did not know if it was realistic.
"We are not big enough to rebuild," she finally said.
"I do not think there's anything left," added Melissa Chapman.
This would be worrisome for tomorrow and the next day, however, as Florence continued her prolonged and violent trajectory in the Carolinas. For now, Huggins had to go home, so she rushed to her car and left the post office, her yellow flashing dissolving into glamor.
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