15 rescued, dozens without homes in Mountain Island Lake evacuation zone

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (WBTV) – Scores of homes are submerged and more than a dozen were rescued in neighborhoods under a mandatory evacuation notice in northwest Charlotte Saturday morning.

Since Friday morning, officials put residents on Riverside Drive, Lake Drive, Riverhaven Drive and parts of Beagle Club Road and Hart Road under a mandatory evacuation notice as Mountain Island Lake’s levels were expected to rise significantly after Hurricane Helene.

Drone 3 video shows the devastation Saturday morning throughout the mandatory evacuation zone on Riverside and Lake Drives, neighborhoods near Mountain Island.

Levels rose dramatically Friday night and Saturday morning in the evacuation zone. Mountain Island Lake rose to more than 107 feet as floodwaters made their way through the Catawba River system.

Along Lake Drive and the Catawba River, the effects were obvious: Friday morning, WBTV had done live reports under one home built on stilts 12 feet high; the water had been about six inches deep at the time. Saturday morning, the water under the home had risen nearly to the top of the 12-foot rise.

Those levels throughout the evacuation area are expected to rise throughout the day and through Saturday night, officials said.

Police said people who refused to leave during the mandatory evacuation Friday needed rescuing on Saturday morning.

The Charlotte Fire Department said 15 people have been rescued Saturday morning within the evacuation zone. So far, they do not know if everyone is accounted for, but everyone who has called is accounted for.

Residents in the area told WBTV a local family had also rescued people who lived along Riverside Drive in their own boat.

The flooding comes as the Mountain Island Lake rose several feet overnight as flood waters from Lake Norman made its way through the system of lakes in the Duke Energy-managed Catawba-Wateree River Basin.

A spokesperson for Duke Energy, Jeff Brooks, tweeted a video Saturday morning discussing the current situation with flood gates open at the Cowans Ford Dam on Lake Norman.

“Those gates are designed to lower water levels in our reservoirs when we’re managing waterflow through our system,” Brooks said. “If you think about our system, it’s a series of spillways and gates that can be used to manage waterflow after major events like Hurricane Helene that we’ve seen in the last few days.”

Saturday morning, groups of residents and their friends and neighbors huddled together on the edge of the water, looking at what was left of their homes.

“This is five times bigger than 2019,” Riverside Drive resident Tim Davis said, referring to the last major flooding of the area that destroyed dozens of homes.

“Every house down here is gone. Every house down here.”

Another two or three feet would destroy the few left that might be salvageable, he said. Saturday morning, that scenario looked likely as emergency officials continued to warn residents that water was expected to keep rising.

Davis had just waded himself through the dangerous and rapidly moving waters to rescue one of his horses, Hugo. He worried his other horse at 37 years old wouldn’t survive a rescue attempt.

“It’s me and my brother’s first flood down here, and it’s really sad.” Three children who lived just uphill of the devastation had watched Hugo’s rescue with bated breath.

“We were worried,” they said.

The trio speaks for nearly everyone who stood on the flood waters’ edge on Saturday. One woman walking up to see it for the first time could barely contain her shock.

“Oh my god,” she whispered. “Oh my god.”

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