2 years after Helene, woman still seeks 2 missing relatives
By Kimberly King
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YANCEY COUNTY, North Carolina (WLOS) — Nearly two years after Helene devastated western North Carolina, 48-year-old Anna Wiebe of Burnsville still lives with the unanswered questions surrounding the deaths of four members of her family.
Wiebe had helped her family leave war-torn Ukraine and come to North Carolina for a safer life. Instead, they were caught in catastrophic flooding along the South Toe River in Yancey County on Sept. 27, 2024.
The bodies of Wiebe’s mother, Tetyana Novitnia, and her 13-year-old nephew, Yevhenii Segen, have never been found.
Wiebe’s sister, Anastasiia Novitnia Segen, 42, and brother-in-law, Dmytro Segen, were recovered in the days following Helene.
“It’s hard enough when somebody you love dies from illness,” said Anna. “But when four members of your family go missing and two of them still not found it makes it even harder.”
Wiebe, who is originally from Ukraine, married Ryan Wiebe, who had roots in western North Carolina. The couple settled in rural Yancey County.
Wiebe said her family came to North Carolina to be closer to her and to find a life that was safer than the one they had left behind in Ukraine.
The Blue Trailer Wiebe took News 13 to the area where her four relatives had been living in a blue trailer near the Patience Park campground, about a mile and a half from Anna’s home.
Anna’s niece, Lisa Gindinova, who lives in New York, provided photos of the trailer.
“In front of this tree. Right here. That’s where their trailer was,” said Anna as she walked in the field.
The South Toe River was about 300 yards away.
On the day of Helene, Wiebe said Patience Park Road was too dangerous to drive as floodwaters rapidly rose.
“In the morning I sent my sister a text,” said Anna. “She texted back to me it was OK. We’re fine here.”
Minutes later, though, Anna couldn’t reach her sister.
“I saw neighbors’ houses floating by and all I could think about was ‘what about them, what about them,’ the phone is not working,” Anna said.
Video of flooding on the South Toe River, shot from Wiebe’s front porch, shows the Helene floodwaters rising. In one video, the current appears to be moving at a tremendous speed as the river rises well above its banks.
As the floodwaters subsided and conditions became safer, Anna hiked through land adjacent to the trailer that was higher ground than the trailer.
“I thought maybe I would see a roof or something or maybe a little window their faces in it. But it was gone. I knew they were gone,” Anna said. Two years after the tragedy, Anna still cries when she talks about what happened.
“When my brother-in-law was found, I didn’t want to believe it. But then days later my sister was found and there was no denial because they gave me her earring. And then I was thinking probably my mom will be found, and my nephew too, but they never were. If I met the people who found my sister and my brother-in-law, I would like to thank them personally. It means the world to me.”
Searching for the missing Lisa Gindinova flew from New York City to try to help her aunt after Helene.
“For three days straight after the hurricane there was no one,” said Gindinova. “No helicopters, no drones, nothing.”
Gindinova said the area around Patience Park Road and where her relative’s trailer was washed away was desolate for days.
Knowing four members of her family were missing and that she could make calls from her cellphone, Gindinova said she was surprised by what she felt was a lack of search resources sent to the area in the immediate days after the storm.
Today, the field is covered with grass and debris left behind by Helene.
YANCEY COUNTY USES HELICOPTERS TO CLEAR RIVER WHERE MISSING HELENE VICTIMS LIVED
The family has a photograph of one piece of the blue trailer’s siding. They don’t know whether other pieces were found.
Back at her home, Wiebe keeps her sister Anastasiia’s death certificate in a white envelope. For Anna, the document is something tangible showing her sister’s body was found.
The certificate lists 42-year-old Anastasiia’s death as drowning. The date her body was found is October 10, 2024. The date of injury is September 27, 2024 — the day Helene struck western North Carolina.
Sheriff says extensive searches happened Yancey County Sheriff Shane Hilliard said he and his department did everything they could along the South Toe River in the days after Helene to try to recover all four of Anna’s relatives.
Hilliard met News 13 at the South Toe River and described some of the searches conducted after the storm.
He said a dog team from Ohio found Anastasiia’s body along the South Toe River near the bridge for U.S. Highway 19E — about eight miles from where the family’s trailer had been.
Hilliard said a New York task force team found Dmytro Segen’s body about two miles downstream from where the family’s trailer had been.
“They were brought in the day before the hurricane,” said Hilliard. “That team was one of the first working once conditions became safe.”
Hilliard printed maps showing News 13 the winding path of the South Toe River and explained that large debris piles remain along portions of the river that have been difficult to access.
“So, we’re just a little over 8 miles, I believe it’s 8.3 miles from where their home set to this location,” said Hilliard as he stood about 50 feet from the riverbank at the U.S. Highway 19E bridge where Anastasiia’s body was found.
“There were recoveries going on the first few weeks, in different places throughout the county. We had some crews tasked with searching the entire river. The sheriff’s office was focused on areas where we knew we had missing. About half our deaths occurred in landslides and the other half was water,” Hilliard said.
Hilliard said the conditions after the storm were extremely difficult. In areas where people died in landslides, the challenge was getting heavy machinery in place to remove debris, he said.
“We knew we had bodies, but we physically couldn’t get to them,” Hilliard said.
Hilliard said 11 people were initially reported missing in Yancey County after Helene. He said three people currently remain missing, including Wiebe’s mother and nephew.
“We want nothing more than to give these families closure,” Hilliard said. NAMES OF 108 VICTIMS KILLED BY HURRICANE HELENE IN NORTH CAROLINA RELEASED: NCDHHS
News 13 asked Hilliard what more he could do to help bring that closure.
“One of the big things is there’s been approval from FEMA to remove some of the larger debris piles and we’ve got cadaver dogs that are going to come as those debris piles are being removed,” Hilliard said.
That debris removal and search happened earlier this week on the Wiebe property. One dog from the SBI was on scene. Anna Wiebe said she and her husband were notified about the work around the same time News 13 began asking authorities what efforts had been made in recent months to continue any search.
The search this week was of debris where the family’s trailer was. No remains were found.
Could the missing remains still be in the river? Hilliard described what he said were extensive efforts to search for remains along the South Toe River.
He went with News 13 to a second location along the river closer to Anna and her husband Ryan’s home.
“From here up has been searched numerous times with cadaver dogs by people with different organizations. I’ve floated this personally myself,” Hilliard said about the South Toe River. “There’s debris piles and any of the big bends you’re going to have really large debris piles. I think one possibility is they’re submerged under the water in sand.”
If the remains are submerged, Hilliard said, cadaver dogs would not be able to detect a scent.
Hilliard said accessing debris piles along the South Toe River remains difficult, adding that much of the property is privately owned and many areas are deeply wooded, including canyons and terrain that make it difficult to bring in equipment to dig through debris piles.
“We had some that was tasked with searching the entire river whether we had confirmed people missing or not,” said Hilliard of the initial searches after Helene.
Hilliard’s own family also faced hardship after Helene, something Anna Wiebe said she understands.
But Anna said she wants the sheriff and anyone who learns of her story to think of the pain she continues to endure.
“I’m glad the sheriff’s family and everybody was OK,” said Anna. “Their houses was washed away and it was terrible. But they didn’t lose their loved ones. I’m sure if they did, they would still be looking until they found them. Is this it? Nobody can do anything to find my mom and my nephew? Anyone in my shoes would want their loved one to be found. I still hope maybe somehow they’ll be found.”
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