25 Things I Did Wrong Prepping for Hurricane Helene

I have always been a prepper after living through multiple natural disasters. I know how important it is to have essential items on hand, and what those items are.

However, nothing could have prepared me for living through one of the deadliest natural disasters in American history, Hurricane Helene.

Living in the North Carolina mountains, prepping for a flood was never a thought I had. Yet that is exactly what happened.

While our home wasn’t washed away like so many other people in the region, we did have unexpected flooding in our lower living level which we never thought would be possible.

Especially since we live on the top of a hill and outside of the 500-year flood plain.

But this was a once in a 1,000 year flood.

Thankfully my emergency preparedness helped us live a somewhat comfortable life in the middle of 12 days without power and a natural disaster that will take the area years to recover from. Yet there are still some lessons I learned in the midst of this disaster.

These are the 25 Things I Did Wrong Prepping for Hurricane Helene. Learn from my mistakes and make sure you prepare.

1. Not Enough Backups and Redundancies

We always assumed that in a disaster we would use our grills to cook food outdoors, and electric burners to cook food indoors with our Jackery.

Even with three options, we still found ourselves struggling to cook food because of unforeseen circumstances.

First, we opened the grill and it was completely covered in mold inside. Not just the grate, but every single surface. This has never happened before in years of use, and the grill is always thoroughly cleaned after every use.

Second, the small propane grill we had previously used for camping had a mice nest in it. So that wasn’t an option either.

Finally, the two electric burners that I put in our emergency supplies could not be found. I had recently “organized” and couldn’t find where I had put the boxes. I looked everywhere, but it was really difficult to look through boxes when the garage was flooded and there was stuff everywhere. Eventually I found the burners in a “smart” place two weeks later.

Even with multiple backups planned in theory, the reality is that we only had one burner on the grill (it was located on the side outside of the grilling area and not covered in mold) to use.

2. Not Having a Backup Communications Plan

Communications has always been the area of prepping that I knew I needed to work on, but due to the cost I never really pursued.

My Dad and I had just had the conversation a week or two before Hurricane Helene saying that we needed to figure something out because what would happen if cell phones didn’t work?

And that’s exactly what happened in Hurricane Helene.

For 48 hours I did not have any contact with my parents, who live about 45 minutes away and across the mountains.

On the second day, my dad hiked to a mountain top and was able to get enough cell reception to call. Then I wasn’t able to talk to my parents for another two days until they found someone with a generator and Starlink access and could make a quick call over WiFi.

I was not able to get in touch with my sister, who lives 15 minutes away, due to downed cell phone towers and service being throttled to accommodate emergency communications. It took four days to reach her.

We will be investing in satellite communications soon (this satellite communicator is what I’m looking at as an option) as this is top priority!

3. Not Enough Cookware or Ways to Clean It

This would not have been a problem if we had a septic system that worked during the two weeks without power. However, we have a lift-station for our septic that needs power to push the wastewater up the hill and into the septic tank.

While we had running water for all but one day, we could not use it because we could not add water into our septic system.

Cooking food soon became a logistical challenge because of lack of pots and pans. While we could bring cookware to our neighbors to wash, there was no hot water for a while. Unless we were able to clean the residue off the pots immediately (which wasn’t ideal), we really needed hot water for sanitation and proper cleaning.

Rinsing off the pots and pans and doing dishes outside wasn’t a great idea, either, because of all the grease and the concern of attracting bears, raccoons and other wildlife.

In the future, I’d like to add more disposable aluminum pans to use for cooking on the grill or campfire. While you can buy pans at the Dollar Tree, I am interested in these heavy-duty aluminum foil pots that would probably be stronger and easier to cook soup and boil water in.

4. Heavy Duty Rain Gear and Boots

In the middle of the hurricane, my husband went outside to try to sweep the water away from downstairs windows because it was seeping in.

Hurricane rain is unlike normal rain, where it blows sideways and wind gusts make it impossible to wear a poncho.

While we have umbrellas and water-resistant jackets, those are no match for disaster situations. Plus, hiking boots are not waterproof and he went through three pairs while trying to work outside and in the flooded basement.

We needed proper rain boots and a heavy duty rain coat that is fitted with snaps and a zipper, as well as a hood.

5. Lack of Organization and Accessibility

We had a lot of the things that were necessary after a disaster. I just couldn’t find them.

Like everyone else who has emergency preparedness items on hand, you will probably find that you don’t have much room for everything. So you start putting things here and there.

That’s not good in a disaster where time is of the essence.

If you have master lists that tell you where things are located, that’s great. I had some lists, too. But not for everything.

I found that I couldn’t find some of the most important preps that I knew I had somewhere (burn spray, plastic forks and spoons, electric burners, etc.).

And some items I knew where they were, but could no longer access them because we had piled stuff from the flooded basement in front of the supplies as we were trying to save items from water.

Put everything you need in one place (if possible) and make sure that you are able to easily and quickly get to it.

Make the organization fool-proof, with lists and see-through containers of like-minded items. You will be in shock after a disaster and not thinking straight. Make things as simple as you can for yourself.

6. Not Taking a Shower the Night Before

While we were never forecasted to have a hurricane and extreme flooding, we were warned of heavy rains and possible power outages.

I should have taken a shower the night before. It would be five or six days before we were able to shower after the storm.

Even one more day of feeling clean and showered make a big deal to your morale.

7. Water Bottles in Freezer

While I did pack the freezers as tightly as I could with ice packs, I only did it half heartedly. We were expecting only a couple days without power and could easily keep the freezers powered for that long.

After day 8, we started eating more foods in the freezer or giving it away. And there were more air gaps which meant that food would not stay frozen as long with the power off.

I filled plastic zip-top bags with water and put them inside the freezer to fill up space and insulate the food, however the bags still had to freeze, which meant using up the cold air in the freezer and needing the water to freeze in the few hours we were running the generator.

I do wish that I had packed every spare inch with frozen bags or bottles of water so that the foods stayed cold as long as possible.

8. Penny on an Ice Cube

Putting a penny on top of an ice cube is an easy trick to see what the temperatures were like inside your freezer during a power outage.

A penny will stay on top of the ice cube if everything inside stayed frozen. If temperatures rise, the ice will melt and the penny will drop to the bottom. Then you know that your food did not stay frozen.

I didn’t do this prior to the power going out and wish I had.

9. Not Doing Laundry

I really needed to do some laundry before the storm. However, we had two days of heavy rain before Hurricane Helene came through and the power was flickering.

Since my front-loading washing machine will just stop in a power outage and not drain (which means the clothes are stuck in water until the power comes back on), I didn’t want to chance doing loads of laundry.

After 12 days of no power, we were definitely running out of clothing and towels and really needed to do laundry. We could have had a little more wiggle room with our laundry needs if everything was clean before the storm.

10. Too Few Potable Water Bottles

We had lots of bottled water, but they were all room temperature.

I filled up our insulated HydroFlasks with ice water the night before so that we would have cold water without needing to open the refrigerator during a power outage. We even filled glass jars with tap water, too.

However, I still wish we had filled more insulated containers with ice cold water (or even ice) beforehand. A cold drink in the humidity after a hurricane instantly improves morale.

11. Essential Preps Still in the Box

There were so many things I bought to have on hand in an emergency that I had never taken out of the box, tried using or read the instruction manual.

That is a mistake.

For instance, I had a cast iron skillet to use if needing to cook on an open fire. It was still in the box, still in plastic and I had never tried it out.

When we ran out of pots and pans to use, we decided to use the cast iron pan on the grill. However, my first thought was “Is it seasoned?” That’s something that is necessary with cast iron and I certainly didn’t have the resources to season a pan in the middle of an emergency.

Thankfully this cast iron skillet we have was pre-seasoned. We still didn’t know how to cook with cast iron, though.

In another instance (not Hurricane Helene), my husband was not feeling good and we were really concerned. I went to get the pulse oximeter I have in my emergency kit to check heart rate and couldn’t find it. I wasted 10 minutes trying to find the item. Then, once I found it, I discovered the batteries inside were corroded.

Once I found new batteries, I spent at least 10 minutes trying to figure out how to get the batteries in. If it had been a real emergency, I would have wasted 20 minutes.

You should always familiarize yourself with items that you have on hand. Figure out how to use them when you buy them, and then once or twice a year give yourself a refresher course.

12. Didn’t Use Emergency Radio

We have an emergency radio (I think I know where it is…) but we never turned it on.

The power was on in the early hours of Hurricane Helene, and we were getting information from Facebook and online sources.

What we didn’t know was that information was one-sided and not telling the whole story of what was going on outside of our community.

In the hours and days after the storm hit, we should have at least turned on the emergency radio to listen to what news reports were saying, rather than making assumptions based on what we saw on Facebook and Instagram posts.

13. Not Knowing About Starlink / Satellite Access for Emergency Connectivity

While the first few hours and a couple days after the flooding we had decent cell phone signals, it went bad pretty quickly after that. Around days 3-6 the ability to get cellular data was very difficult. In fact, on day 5, the entire network went down for 24 hours. NOTHING was able to get through, from phone calls to texts to checking emails or weather reports.

We were able to get on Facebook intermittently and friends and family members repeatedly told me to turn on settings on my phone to access the closest satellite for data.

No matter how much I tried, I couldn’t find this setting.

Turns out that emergency satellite / Starlink access is a feature on iPhones 14 and later. It is found in your Settings and is an easy option to toggle on.

Our iPhones were an older model so we didn’t have that feature, but if we had I wonder if we would have been able to communicate easier.

Many people now have bought Starlink as a reliable backup communication in case the grid goes down, including cell phone towers, cables and fiber connections. Most people with Starlink never lost connectivity as long as they had power or a generator.

14. Relying on Facebook Information as Fact

During the first week and a half after the hurricane, trying to get on the internet was very slow. We couldn’t get the weather app on our phone to come up because it was too graphic intensive. Website searches via Google would take minutes to load.

However, Facebook would load pretty quickly. Even if the comments and graphics weren’t loading, we could still access information in groups.

What we found out, though, is people say a lot of things on Facebook, only half of which are true.

In our city’s Facebook group, other people were asking about road closures. Half the people would say a road was open, the other half would say it was closed.

When it came to disaster assistance, commenters were directing people to organizations that could not help them. Or stating that relief assistance was available at locations that were wrong.

And then there were the conspiracy theories…so many conspiracy theories being spread on Facebook.

In the middle of a disaster, you don’t need another layer of frustration in trying to figure out fact from lies.

15. Too Much Baking Ingredients, Not Enough Quick Cook Foods

I have a lot of food in the pantry, but we found out that most of it wasn’t suitable to making quick meals with limited means in the middle of a disaster.

Flour, rice, baking mixes and other pantry staples are great to have if you have the ability to cook over a stove for a while, use an oven, etc. Or you are in a shelter-in-place emergency situation and you have power.

But we didn’t have that ability in this disaster situation.

We didn’t have time to make a meal from scratch. We were racing against time to clear out a flood basement, move items, rip out carpeting and remove drywall.

Meals needed to require no mental energy since we were already exhausted and still in shock from the flooding.

Also, meals needed to be cooked really quickly. Boiling rice for 25 minutes on the one propane burner, while not being able to cook something else at the same time, was not an option.

We quickly started using our cans of soup and canned spaghetti because it was quick and easy. Saltine crackers we had on hand were paired with the soup or spaghetti, and I used up the cheese that was in the refrigerator.

Living off grid in the middle of a disaster is mentally taxing and every single thing you do requires you to think through the steps and change your daily routine. Trying to cook a meal from scratch or follow a recipe using multiple ingredients is a lot to ask of yourself in that situation.

16. Not Using Emergency Toilets Sooner

With no septic system, we were only flushing the toilet once a day in the early days after the flooding. We just assumed we’d have power on sooner than we did, so we were still using the toilets.

Once we realized that power wasn’t coming on for another week, we still had some “stuff” in the toilets. Which sat there and started smelling after many days.

We were putting used toilet paper in trash bags and putting it in the trash outdoors, but that only helps a little bit.

Neighbors had asked us if we wanted to use their toilets. We should have taken them up on the offer earlier. But still, using the bathroom late at night, in the middle of the night or early in the morning is not possible when you have to walk to to your neighbor’s house and knock on the door.

We did have this emergency camping toilet that was bought for off-grid living. And I do have a 5-gallon emergency toilet bucket kit on hand, too.

Neither of which was used because we kept thinking that maybe the next day the power would come on.

17. Not Taking Assistance Earlier

From food donations to hot meals to mental health counseling and government assistance programs, there were a lot of community relief efforts immediately after the hurricane went through.

Since so many people had it worse off than we did, we chose not to use these free community resources.

We should have because there was so much available. People were donating time and items because they cared about everyone in the community, not just the hardest hit.

Mountain folk are a little bit stubborn and will always tell you to give help to someone else because they don’t need it themselves. This was a common theme after the hurricane but you have to keep in mind that everyone was impacted from the storm, even if it was just a power outage. It’s okay to accept the help that was given with love.

Here’s an example of the food boxes being given at our county resource hub after the hurricane:

18. Storing Items in Basement Without Protection

Living in the mountains of North Carolina, we never anticipated our basement flooding. But it did.

The items and keepsakes we had in plastic storage totes were fine. And they were easy to move as we were clearing items out of the basement. But the things stored in cardboard boxes in an effort to be frugal were damaged.

I will store everything that I can in plastic storage boxes from now on. This even includes important paper work and documents.

19. Too Few Towels

We needed lots of towels to dry wet furniture so we could save it, as well as wipe off the water from items we picked up out of the flood.

Walking from the basement up the stairs into the upper living level also tracked a lot of unnecessary water.

While I have always kept old towels and sheets in a plastic bin for use in emergencies, we didn’t have nearly enough. Especially since we were unable to wash the towels after they were used, and it took a day or so to dry out in the sun.

If I knew then what I know now, I would have added even more towels to your stash.

20. Opening Windows The Next Day

With the smell of wet carpet in the home, we opened all the windows the next day to get the smell out. After all, it was a beautiful day with a breeze and we wanted fresh air.

As anyone knows after a tropical storm, though, the humidity was pretty high outside. And that humidity gets inside when you open the windows.

Then it was pretty humid inside the house afterwards. Of course, the flooding in the basement didn’t help.

I might choose not to open windows in high humidity environments next time, because it gets so hot and sticky indoors without air conditioning.

21. No Chocolate

Comfort food, including sweets, is so important for morale in the middle of a disaster. For me, that’s chocolate.

We did have some bags of chocolate in the pantry that we enjoyed during the first week. But then we ran out.

Here’s the thing…no one donates chocolate candy to emergency food banks because it can, and probably will, melt. The foods are often kept outside in the sun after any type of emergency.

Even the hot meals given by churches or disaster relief organizations usually have fruit as a dessert, not chocolate. Except for one meal I got from Mercy Chefs that had a slice of chocolate cake in it that was so appreciated!

One of my smartest preps was to have a canning jar of chocolate chips in the pantry and we did open that jar!

If you love chocolate, you will find that it is not easy to get in the days or weeks after an emergency, so be sure you have a supply!

22. Not Checking In on Neighbors

While we made sure that we saw everyone afterwards and asked if they were okay, we should have asked more questions.

Many of our neighbors didn’t have water to drink and had to go out in the early days after the storm to buy bottled water (which wasn’t easy since the grocery stores were closed). Another neighbor had no food, while yet another neighbor had no generator or way to cook food.

I’ll have to give myself grace in this situation because we were going through a lot and exhausted from trying to take care of the flooded basement, but I wish I had asked more pointed questions about what their needs were to see if we could help.

23. Thinking Amazon, FedEx or UPS Would Deliver

When friends and family started asking how they could help in the early days after the disaster, we requested some fans and dehumidifiers to start drying out the basement. We knew it wouldn’t be immediate, but surely it would be within a week or so, right?

We did see a UPS truck in the neighborhood about day 4, and FedEx went through a day or so later. The postal service didn’t start delivering for about a week, but it was three weeks before Amazon started delivering because their distribution center was impacted.

Do not assume that you will be able to get medications/food/emergency supplies via delivery after a storm.

24. Didn’t Realize Facebook Groups Are Created in a Disaster

While Facebook has its problems, it also has its positives, one of which is that you can create a page or group for just about anything in a few minutes.

After the flooding, multiple groups were created on Facebook to help people find their family and loved ones, connect people with housing, assist with urgent care needs, and help reunite flood victims with their belongings that had washed miles away and were found by others.

I found a Facebook page that was created for community members in my parents neighborhood. At the time, this was the only detailed information that I really had about what was going on where they live because communications were sporadic.

See our YouTube video:

25. No Crystal Ball

I didn’t have a magical crystal ball that could predict one of the deadliest natural disasters in U.S. history even though the forecast called for heavy rains and possible flooding. Seriously, this hurricane was never predicted to be this bad inland. Locals had no idea it was going to get so bad until very early Friday morning when the tropical storm decided to just sit over the mountains and not leave. At that point, roads were impassable and there was no way to evacuate.

You never know what can happen. You have to be prepared for everything.

We did a lot more RIGHT than we did WRONG. Here’s our helpful list of the 48 best things we did during Hurricane Helene.