As insurers count the cost of the once-in-a-century Hurricane Milton, nearby Georgia, estimates that Hurricane Helene has already impacted more than US $1.28 billion in timber stock alone.
That is according to the Georgia Forestry Commission, which revealed that the Hurricane traversed more than 8.9 million acres of forestland—almost 40% of the state’s 24 million acres of timberlands…and causing havoc for landowners who don’t have ‘crop insurance’ to protect their ‘nest eggs.’
Less than a fortnight after Hurricane Milton struck Tamper Bay, Helene caused widespread destruction and fatalities in the Big Bend region of Florida – the deadliest Atlantic hurricane since Maria in 2017 and, until Milton, the deadliest to hit mainland US since Katrina in 2005.
In a report published by Grant Blankenship from the Georgia Public Broadcaster last month, the commercial timber losses (from the hurricane) come to about 1.8 billion dollars across the states hit hardest by Helene. “That’s Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Florida. Georgia alone accounts for about three-quarters of that loss,” according to Mr Blankenship, who spoke to Ben Gillis and his family – a board member on the Georgia Forestry Commission.
“It’s a race against time right now,” Mr Gillis said, adding that sawn timber, which once sold for $35 per tonne, was now fetching just $2 to $4 – a 90% drop in values due to the widespread destruction caused by the storm.
Along with South Carolina and Alabama, Georgia is home to the United States’ largest timber stock – and is considered one of the world’s top growing areas for pulp, paper, and, increasingly, engineered wood products, including cross-laminated timber and glulam.
According to a 2019 report, the state has 207 primary wood processing mills and 1,100 secondary processing mills – processing 47,268,311 logs and transporting 1.9 million truckloads for manufacturing lumber, veneer, sheathing, poles, posts, pulp and biomass.
- To learn more about the potential damage to Flordia’s forest areas caused by Milton, click here for Wood Central’s live coverage. To find out how forest managers in the US’s southeastern regions are now using NASA satellites to better prepare for natural disasters, click here for Wood Central’s special feature.
