HAYWOOD COUNTY, S.C. (WSPA) – Officials with the North Carolina Department of Transportation said the Interstate 40 will be open to drivers soon, after nearly two months of destruction caused by Hurricane Helene.
7NEWS rode along with the North Carolina Department of Transportation to see the progress being made on I-40.
“I don’t think our division, division 14 of NCDOT, has ever seen damage as widespread and as significant to primary routes, secondaries were impacted too,” Division 14 NCDOT Engineer Nathan Tanner said.
Crews working on the roadway said the Westbound lane of I-40 is expected to become passable by New Years Day.
Tanner said both directions of traffic will use the two westbound lanes once stabilization work is complete.
“What you have seen here is a soil nail anchor operation and shot creek repair,” Tanner said.
Tanner said the work is being completed under an emergency contract that costs $10 million.
Crews said permanent work on both sides of the interstate will take years and billions of dollars to complete as nearly five miles of Interstate 40 were extremely damaged.
“I think we are very happy with the progress we have made but we are always going to strive to do better,” Tanner said. “An event of this scale is historic for a lot of the people who work in DOT and this is our home
NCDOT engineers said the road ahead is long, but they’re hopeful in the work being done.
“We are very accustomed to responding to slope failures on the interstate here, so rockslides and stuff like that,” Tanner said. “This is a completely different type of failure for this corridor of roadway. A slope failure of this magnitude is not something that we have ever seen before.”
Officials said that crews will continue to work as hard as they can to rebuild infrastructure damaged by Hurricane Helene.
U.S. Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg visited the site last month, and said North Carolina will receive the help they need and residents in the area should remain hopeful.
