{"id":13081,"date":"2024-10-02T16:39:40","date_gmt":"2024-10-02T16:39:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=13081"},"modified":"2024-10-02T17:02:48","modified_gmt":"2024-10-02T17:02:48","slug":"how-a-trump-phone-call-to-musk-opened-communications-to-thousands-in-western-north-carolina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=13081","title":{"rendered":"How a Trump Phone Call to Musk Opened Communications to Thousands in Western North Carolina"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/www.wisconsinrightnow.com\/one-call-so-western-north-carolina-can-make-thousands\/<\/a><\/p>\n

\"elon<\/p>\n

A North Carolina state senator all too familiar with hurricanes made one call. Western North Carolina will get thousands more out of it.<\/p>\n

In a social media post Tuesday afternoon, state Sen. Danny Britt, R-Robeson, said he put in a call to former President Donald Trump so communications crushed by the remnants of Hurricane Helene could be restored quicker. Trump called Elon Musk, and \u201cas many Starlink devices as we need to help save North Carolinians\u201d are committed, Britt wrote.<\/p>\n

According to its website, Starlink \u201cis the world\u2019s first and largest satellite constellation using a low Earth orbit to deliver broadband internet capable of supporting streaming, online gaming, video calls and more.\u201d Musk\u2019s aerospace company SpaceX is the parent of the subsidiary that launched in 2019.<\/p>\n

Communications companies, like Verizon and AT&T, are dealing with cell towers that tumbled and fiber cables that are damaged. Federal aid \u2013 regularly wrapped in bureacratic government red tape regulations \u2013 has been approved for North Carolina, and is plodding through.<\/p>\n

For a multibillionaire like Musk, efficiency is premium.<\/p>\n

Britt\u2019s district in southeastern North Carolina, on the Interstate 95 corridor, was devastated by Hurricanes Matthew in 2016 and Florence in 2018. Some areas are still recovering.<\/p>\n

Helene was a Category 4 storm when it slammed into the Big Bend of Florida on Thursday evening, zipping northward through Georgia and easing westerly to drench the Appalachian Mountains and Tennessee.<\/p>\n

On Monday afternoon, 425 roads were out<\/a> \u2013 nine of them interstate sections \u2013 and 24 hours later the number had dipped and then risen to 430 at 5 p.m. Only three were interstates, including two lanes of I-40 about 4 miles from the North Carolina-Tennessee state line that slid into the Pigeon River.<\/p>\n

Fifty-seven people died in the Buncombe County area around Asheville. Across six states in the Southeast, the death toll had climbed past 150.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/www.wisconsinrightnow.com\/one-call-so-western-north-carolina-can-make-thousands\/ A North Carolina state senator all too familiar with…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":13083,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wi-right-now"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13081"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13084,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13081\/revisions\/13084"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}