Church volunteers continuing to help rebuild homes damaged by Hurricane Florence

BOLTON, NC (WWAY) — Hurricane Florence caused catastrophic damage across the Cape Fear in September 2018.

And some families are still trying to rebuild 6 and a half years later.

In Bolton, volunteers were hard at work tearing out rotted and wrapped floorboards in John Freeman’s home.

The home suffered more damage than he could handle alone.

Water from Hurricane Florence in 2018 weakened the home’s more than 50-year-old floor.

Now repairs are finally underway, with help from the United Methodist North Carolina Conference Disaster Ministries.

On Tuesday, members of the ministry’s disaster response team spent time tearing up and replacing the kitchen floor.

Freeman’s son Tony said they didn’t realize the extent of the damage from the floor began to sag.

“Observe a little more if you could of seen it, cause sometimes you don’t really know what damage there is, when you got rug and carpet down, you really can’t see what you got going on until it start giving away on you, you know,” Freeman said. “Cause you won’t really know until the floor itself start giving way.”

And Freeman isn’t alone, many residents in Columbus County still need repairs from Florence’s destruction.

Volunteer Jill Steele said more recent storms may have worsened existing damage.

“When you get damage to one house with a hurricane 7 or 8 years ago and that damage is not taken care of at that time, then you risk the fact that another storm or storms in this case, will come along and compound the damage that was caused originally,” Steele said.

Repairs on Freeman’s home will take a few days to complete and Tony said he’s relieved knowing his father will soon be safer in his home.

“He a lot of time here by himself and so if he go down, the floor give out under him, it would be several hours maybe before anyone come out and check on him, you know. And so, now I feel much better about his safety, much better.”

The United Methodist North Carolina Conference Disaster Ministries said they have a list of more than 150 people in Columbus County who are still in need of assistance from Florence and other recent hurricanes.