CARTER COUNTY, Tenn. (WJHL) – Tennessee State Parks across the Tri-Cities region have been impacted by Hurricane Helene. Some are open with limited trails while others remain closed until further notice.

As of Monday, David Crockett Birthplace State Park, Roan Mountain State Park and Rocky Fork State Park are fully closed until further notice.

Roan Mountain State Park Manager Monica Johnson told News Channel 11 the park experienced intense flooding, causing roadways and bridges to be washed away.

“Our main areas of impact have been our campgrounds, picnic shelters, the visitor center bridge was impacted, the parking lot was impacted,” said Johnson. “We’ve had a lot of bridge structures, trail damage from trees falling, and a lot of footbridges, stuff like that out on the trails.”

Johnson said Helene’s damage forced the park to close and cancel all reservations for the month of October.

“It came during our busiest season of the year. October people come for the fall colors,” said Johnson. “We’ve not been able to really advertise fall colors or encourage people to come to see that. It’s definitely the busiest month revenue-wise for us.”

Much of the work that needs to be done at Roan Mountain State Park is debris cleanup and water and power restoration to campsites.

“We still are out of power in our campground. I’m not really sure what the water issue is going to be there because we’re on a well system here,” said Johnson. “Once power gets turned back on, we’ll have to check all the water, the bathrooms and restrooms and make sure there’s no leaks.”

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Outdoors Appalachia

Johnson said she hopes Roan Mountain State Park will be able to open back up at the beginning of November, but that is subject to change. Other parks like Sycamore Shoals State Historic Park have been able to reopen with limited trails.

“Well, just like the rest of the area, we had extreme high winds. The river rose very rapidly, we were fortunate enough not to be as impacted as other parts of the county,” said Jason Davis, Park Manager at Sycamore Shoals State Historic Park. “The rest of the community I feel like suffered significantly more damage than we did.”

Davis told News Channel 11 that parts of the park near the Watauga River experienced the most damage.

“We do have portions of the trail that are closed; we have multiple barricades up preventing people from accessing that area,” said Davis. “Specifically, the lower loop on our walking trail, we lost that lower loop as well as the second bridge on the trail.”

Davis said management wanted to open the park as soon as possible to give people a place to go find peace and quiet.

“We really wanted to get things cleaned up and open so that folks could at least have somewhere that they could go in the midst of all the chaos of trying to get their lives back,” said Davis. “To be able to come and enjoy something and find a place where they could have some peace with their families without having kind of that reminder.”

Davis said all of Sycamore Shoals trails are open except for the lower portion of Patriots Path, the walking trail located along the Watauga River.

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