On a gloomy and chilly Monday evening, nearly a dozen Martinsville residents gathered to stuff a truck with aid for North Carolinians most heavily impacted by the remnants of Hurricane Helene. The clouds held until most of the volunteers arrived at the parking lot outside Sovah Health. Then a soft rain descended on them as they moved supplies by hand to the truck.
While the storm spent the weekend battering southeastern states, Martinsville and Henry County were largely spared.
“I’ve not been made aware of any major damage,” Henry County Public Information Officer Brandon Martin said.
Martinsville fared similarly.
“Fortunately, there were no reports of major damage within the city limits,” said John Turner, Martinsville’s emergency management coordinator. “It appears that most of the tornado warnings somewhat developed over or near the city and quickly moved to other areas of the county to the east and north. As far as flooding, there were no reports of major flooding and only a few reports of water ponding in a few locations.”
Just south of Martinsville, past the border separating Virginia from North Carolina, other communities weren’t as lucky. Asheville and western North Carolina were among the hardest hit. The devastation was enough to spring Martinsville resident Patrick Hawks into action.
“It is a civilian effort,” Hawks said, emphasizing that this was not the effort of a single group but a coalition of groups, churches and individuals. Everything, from collecting to dropping off donations, is part of the effort.
“This is all shooting from the hip,” Hawks had said earlier, adding that this is the first time he and others have participated in this kind of relief effort.
Sovah Health was one of the organizations involved. Staff members not only donated cases of water but also helped load up the trailer.
“We’re here to help the community, and we’re always here to help Martinsville,” said Heather Ashe, Sovah Health’s director of pharmacy. “When the sister hospitals are in need, and we can help, we’re going to.”
Hawks, along with Danville residents Crystal Lawrence and James Silvey, kicked off the effort on Sunday and managed to raise the equivalent of three trailers’ worth of food and water.
On Monday evening, Hawks and about a dozen others braved the rain to fill up a trailer with cases of water and some nonperishable food items. The trailer was at the Martinville Sovah Health location, at 325 Hospital Drive, and a handful of Sovah staff came out to help with loading up the supplies.
Despite having enough to fill a significant portion of the trailer, they were done within an hour. Hawks and a couple of others were inside the truck, moving things to the back to make room. Adults, children and hospital staff helped. Hawks stood out, wearing a bright yellow rain jacket.
In spite of the rain, people seemed cheerful.
The two other drop-off sites are KTL Restorations, 135 Airside Drive in Danville, and Sovah Health’s Danville location, 142 S. Main St. Hawks said water is one of the major needs, along with beverages like Gatorade. Nonperishable food items, jackets and socks are also welcome.
The supplies are bound for drop-off locations throughout North Carolina that were established by officials in each locality.
“We’ve got four areas that we’re looking to impact,” Hawks said: Rutherfordton, Statesville, Hickory and Asheville. Canton was later added as a fifth location.
Statesville, the closest of the five, is an almost two-hour drive from Martinsville. The county seat of Iredell County, the city of just under 30,000 sits 100 miles of road beyond the border. Hawks said the effort to provide relief aid to North Carolina speaks to Martinsville’s unique position of maintaining relations with both its home state and its immediate southern neighbor.
“In 1989, this particular area came together before,” Hawks said. “We just decided to step up as a community and do it again.”
At the time, Hurricane Hugo had damaged communities across South Carolina. Hawks said he remembered Martinsville residents loading up trucks with donations and driving them to affected communities in South Carolina.
“We just decided to step up as a community and do it again.”
Hawks said he believes that this kind of multistate solidarity can be seen not just in Martinsville but in Tennessee and North Carolina.
He said the effort won’t stop until they are no longer needed or until aid supplies have been exhausted.
