In Florence, some return home while others are at risk of flooding

The couple returned home Thursday for the first time since hurricane Florence, and it was not like they remembered it. The dirty water stained the walls once white as paint, with a brown line at 6 feet marking the height of the flood. Pieces of hardwood flooring and furniture were scattered on the soft, swollen carpet.

"It's so hard to see things this way, we've been researching how to clean it up," said Nathan Harvey at CNN's affiliate, WECT. "We knew it would be a mess, but it's … so discouraging."

The people of Wilmington slowly return to a new reality after the swollen rivers and floods of Florence cut the city of 118,000 inhabitants.

But two weeks after Florence hit the coast of the Carolinas, overflowing rivers continue to be of concern as they head for the ocean. South Carolina officials say that Georgetown County, where the Waccamaw and Pee Dee rivers join other rivers en route to the Atlantic Ocean, is particularly under threat. The Waccamaw River is scheduled to meet Friday morning, according to Coast Guard spokesman Ryan Dickinson.

"The main concern of this ridge is that it is the highest point that the river will reach before starting to fall below the record," said meteorologist Robert Shackelford Friday.

"With peak floods, low-lying areas may be inundated, and they may continue to affect the roads used to deliver food."

The ridge is the result of floods of small creeks that flow into the big rivers, a process that can take days.

Georgetown has avoided the ferocious winds of Florence, but is at the mouth of the Waccamaw, Great Pee Dee and Sampit rivers, making it particularly vulnerable to flooding.

The Waccamaw River had inflated to record levels upstream and in some areas the water was moving downstream to historical levels.

Coast Guard crews have sent shallow water intervention boats in case they need to evacuate people to Georgetown and Myrtle Beach.

"During Matthew's battle, he rose to about 14 feet and we are preparing to overtake him," Dickinson said.

In North Carolina, Governor Roy Cooper warned residents to stay alert for high waters, even as the rivers recede and more roads open.

Coastal waters are loaded with pollutants

Overflowing rivers and flooding problems are not the only problem. The murky waters of the after-Florence are filled with bacteria, viruses and other pollutants.