When Ronda Hughes moved back to Seven Springs, N.C., she felt like she was moving home. As a single mother juggling 3 jobs as she raised her five children, she wanted the peace and familiarity of the place she had grown up.
“You have one foot in civilization. We have traffic on Main Street. But when you're sitting on the deck at night you not only hear those sounds of civilization but you can also hear the sounds coming the nature sounds from the river,” said Mayor Stephen Potter. “So it's like having a foot in both worlds.”
Seven Springs itself has deep roots. Proud to be the oldest town in Wayne County, it is well known for its Old Timey Days and Christmas Festivals which draw families from the rural areas surrounding it. Within its technical borders live about 60 people, said Mayor Stephen Potter. However, he considers the people in the farms surrounding to be part of the population as well.
Hughes and her family are part of this number. Now living with her husband and three grandchildren, they have opened a fishing store on the banks of the Neuse River, and only 30 feet from their home.
While serene and beautiful most days, this river has also been the source of stress and damage to the families who live on the surrounding land. When Hurricane Matthew hit in 2016, water rose from the river and flooded the store up to six feet, leaving Hughes to start over.
“When we first opened up we were very busy. Then the flood come along, and we were closed for 18 months,” said Hughes. They were able to open the store for seven more months. Then in September 2018 Hurricane Florence hit.
“Not knowing what your future’s gonna be, which nobody truly knows what the future’s gonna be. But if you’ve got a home and you feel pretty safe you’re gonna have a home. But if you live beside the river, a flood could come and everything could change in the drop of a hat,” Hughes said.
When they saw Florence heading their way, the Hughes packed up everything they could in the store, put it in high places and prayed.
Luckily, the water only came up to knee deep.
“You don’t never know. So that’s why we took everything down,” said Hughes. “We will be back in some fashion or form, but it just takes a little while.”
Hurricane Florence was what hydrologists call a 1,000-year rainfall event. These designations tell more about the probability of water rising than they do about weather over time. For example, a 1,000-year flood means there is a 0.1% chance (or 1 every 1000 years) that a flood or rainfall of that magnitude could happen in a given year. Hurricane Matthew, just a year before, brought some of the worst flooding North Carolina had ever seen.
Florence dumped an estimated eight trillion gallons of water onto North Carolina, with some areas receiving almost three feet of rainfall as the storm slowly crawled over the state. In comparison, Hurricane Matthew had less rainfall but happened in a shorter amount of time, bringing more flooding. But with these events so close together, many are concerned about the future of Seven Springs and its surrounding areas. Scientists believe that as climate change continues to warm the oceans and change air pressures, dramatic weather events such as this will become much more common.
Mayor Stephen Potter speaks about Seven Spring's history of flooding.
The community sees it as an ultimatum - lift their houses and buildings, or leave.
“If you’re going to live in this floodplain, you need to ensure that your house is elevated to the point that you would be safe in the event of a flood disaster,” said Potter. He recently elevated his house to eight feet (shown above). “After this elevation, if it gets in the house again I don’t think there will be anything left to save.”
After the hurricanes, most of the businesses left downtown. Potter’s house, up the hill, overlooks abandoned buildings, with windows smashed in and items left to rot or wash away. Farther down the road, the last restaurant in town tries to keep its doors open. A few more yards down sits Hughes’ store – still closed for business.
Property values are low, with no one wanting to move into the floodplain. FEMA has offered to buy out people’s properties, but the system is slow and backlogged, so residents have been waiting years for approval. Without flood insurance, it is incredibly expensive to rebuild and pay to lift houses and businesses to at least four feet off the ground.
Resident Barbara Daly speaks about her experiences after the flooding.
“You know, you put so much work into something to build something. And you don’t know what you’re going to come home to,” said Hughes. “To see it just swallowed up by the water, you know there’s nothing you can do about it. When it floods it’s going to flood.”
Those who decided to stay, including Hughes and Potter, are fighting tooth and nail to find a way that allows them to live alongside the river they love, with its accompanying threats.
Mayor Stephen Potter on Seven Springs' population changes after the storms.
“But each storm is different and you don’t know. You know the only thing you can do is be as prepared as you can and make sure that you’re going to be safe and look after the safety of yourself, your family and your pets,” said Potter.
No matter what, the Seven Springs community is tight knit and supportive. Neighbors rely on neighbors for everything from Sunday dinner to carpooling children.
“People step up and help you out and you don’t have to ask them. If you need help moving that stuff back in the aftermath,” said Hughes. “It’s like a big family. We might be here in a different way than what it started out originally, but I do believe we’re here to stay. And [if we move] it won’t be because we haven’t tried.”