Protecting an Appalachian treasure: The Nolichucky River

For many avid paddlers, a perfect spring day means packing up the car and heading towards one of the region’s most iconic whitewater destinations: the Nolichucky River. At nearly 2,000 feet deep, the Nolichucky River Gorge is one of the deepest gorges east of the Mississippi.

Carving through the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina and Tennessee, the scenic river serves as a refuge for rare species like the cryptic Eastern hellbender and endangered Appalachian elktoe mussel. Clean water from the watershed provides an important drinking water source for some downstream communities.

The storm that changed everything

In September of 2024, communities nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains and beyond were hit with the unexpected. Tropical storm Helene, a storm intensified by climate change, made landfall; and brought powerful winds, reaching 106 mph at its highest peak in North Carolina. Twenty to thirty inches of rain poured down across the region, causing historic flooding in the river’s watershed and over 2,000 landslides. Rainfall was the heaviest in the Nolichucky River watershed.

Homes and businesses were destroyed. Power and water outages lasted for weeks. Roads were blocked with debris making travel dangerous or impossible.

There’s a right way to rebuild

The devastation from a storm of this magnitude meant that much of the destroyed infrastructure needed to be rebuilt. With an estimated total of $78.7 billion worth of damage across multiple states, rebuilding was going to be a huge effort that needs to happen quickly but not at the cost of doing long-term harm to our natural resources.

Mining the riverbed to rebuild a railroad

After Helene, repair efforts on railroads damaged from flooding began. CSX Transportation, a major railroad company, started mining the Nolichucky’s riverbed for raw materials. The gorge has no road access—just the railroad—so it was out of sight for regulators. Without complying with legal requirements, including zero efforts to notify nearby communities about the project, CSX began using heavy machinery to remove rock from the riverbed, which threatened to harm aquatic wildlife and destroy portions of the channel that paddlers—including several local rafting businesses—used to navigate the rapids.

Here’s how we took action:

SELC on behalf of American Rivers and American Whitewater sued several federal agencies for allowing CSX to mine the Nolichucky River and putting the already impacted river at even more risk.

Shortly after being sued, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers told the Court, based on its communications with CSX, that the railroad company was no longer operating machinery in the river or mining the riverbed for rock. Our partners on the ground, however, captured video evidence that CSX was violating that commitment. Rather than lie to the Court, the Corps was forced to order CSX to stop mining the Nolichucky for rock and prohibit excavation until the Corps put new approvals in place.

SELC continued to press the lawsuit to ensure that the agencies enforced these limitations. The reconstruction finished in early 2026, and we were able to dismiss the lawsuit.

“From the beginning, we said that CSX should be able to rebuild its rail line in the Nolichucky River Gorge, it just needed to do so in a way that follows the law and doesn’t put the river and the people that depend on it at risk,” said Patrick Hunter, managing attorney at SELC’s Asheville office. “We are glad that our lawsuit gave voice to the concerns of local citizens who depend on this river.”

Opportunistic logging violated multiple laws

As rebuilding efforts continued, the gorge became the target of a logging project. Within the Pisgah National Forest, an area designated as backcountry, as an old-growth forest reserve, and as an “exceptional” North Carolina Natural Heritage Natural Area was opportunistically chosen by the U.S. Forest Service for a logging project that violated federal law, disregarded emergency protocols, and failed to comply with public notice requirements.

Public notice, transparency, and accountability are the absolute bare minimum of what the Forest Service owes our communities.

Sam Evans, National Forests and Parks Program Leader

“North Carolina’s national forests are full of natural wonders that support local economies. Public notice, transparency, and accountability are the absolute bare minimum of what the Forest Service owes our communities before it opens these forests for logging,” Sam Evans, leader of SELC’s National Forests and Parks Program, said.

Here’s how we took action:

Working on behalf of MountainTrue and the Center for Biological Diversity, SELC sued the Forest Service after refusing to stop the unlawful logging operation. Days after the lawsuit, equipment from the area was removed and the Forest Service canceled the timber contract, marking a significant win for North Carolina’s national forests and the communities that depend on them.

Stopping logging in the area was crucial to preventing permanent scars on the landscape, pollution in the Nolichucky River, and further harm to the area’s backcountry qualities.

An illegal mine on the banks of the Nolichucky 

Just across the river from the logging site, mining company Horizon 30 LLC operated an unlawful 50-acre mine for nearly eight months without a state mining permit.

The company violated the Clean Water Act by abandoning the site and unlawfully discharging mining waste and runoff into the Nolichucky and a nearby trout stream. Drainage from the site and unstable, bare slopes threatened more erosion and potential landslides in the area.

Here’s how we took action:

SELC warned Horizon 30 and the owner of the illegal mining site to stop polluting the Nolichucky River and its tributaries with sediment and other toxic mining wastes or face a lawsuit.

“Horizon 30 came to North Carolina, destroyed a mountainside, took what they wanted and left a mess. Now, North Carolinians are stuck paying the price for the unlawful pollution that continues to harm North Carolina’s Nolichucky River Gorge,” said Jamie Whitlock, senior attorney at SELC. “If the company and the owners of the mine site don’t clean up their mess, legal action must be taken to protect this important area from additional harmful pollution.

SELC’s filing pushed the state towards legal action to hold the mining company accountable. The state has filed claims in court that Horizon 30 violated water-quality standards and threatened the health of the river and nearby communities.

The road to recovery

Every time this Appalachian treasure was threatened, SELC worked hand in hand with our partners to protect the river, aquatic wildlife, and the communities that rely on the river’s resources. Today, despite all these threats, the Nolichucky River Gorge remains one of the most scenic and spectacular places in the Southeast. The gorge is back in business; local economies are being rebuilt, and visitors to the region are encouraged to enjoy all the area has to offer.

Progress has been seen throughout the region, but recovery efforts are still underway, even almost two years later. Recovering from this historic, climate-driven storm is critical, but not at the expense of doing severe harm to this unique environment and the people that depend on it.