EDNEYVILLE, N.C. — Linda Pryor had checked on one of her family’s sprawling apple orchards, where tree trunks still bore the high-water marks from Hurricane Helene and a sea of rotten, flood-tainted fruit carpeted the ground.
She had navigated washed-out sections of road and a missing bridge to check on other fields, where endless rows of corn lay flattened, brown and unharvested — and where the raging waters had deposited appliances and hot tubs, children’s toys and trash cans and tires.
