When Hurricane Helene swept through Asheville, North Carolina, it dealt devastating blows to the water system, wiping out treatment centers, ripping apart pipes and washing out the access roads to those treatment centers.

More than two weeks after the hurricane, water is just starting to flow from faucets in Asheville again. But it’s not drinkable and sometimes looks like chocolate soup.

The lack of clean water has made commerce here nearly impossible. So businesses and community organizations are trying all kinds of things to get by.

At Mother, a bakery and cafe in downtown Asheville, volunteers have been handing out free sandwiches to lines of hungry locals on Fridays. Owner Brett Watson said without clean water, the cafe can’t legally sell food. He’s resorted to bringing in large cisterns as a way to supply the cafe with water.

“So what we are doing is working on having pumps and hoses plumbed into our existing lines to bypass the city water system,” he said. “We’re working on that right now. [It’s] probably a couple weeks away.”

In the meantime, the cafe can only serve food, like its classic jambon beurre baguette sandwich, in exchange for donations. The collected money goes to staff, who’ve been temporarily laid off.

Co-owner Heidi Bass said her workers are getting unemployment benefits, but the checks are not enough.

“They’re getting a tiny fraction of what they would make on a normal basis,” she said. She added that the donations are, hopefully, “what’s going to keep people from defaulting on mortgages and, you know, not being able to pay rent.”

There are some 20,000 hospitality workers in the Asheville area who are in a similar situation, according to City Councilmember Sage Turner. 

“I am very worried about our business community, the backbone of our community, really, our big job providers, employment, employers, facilities, all of it,” Turner said.

Typically, October is peak tourism season. With so many businesses unable to operate, it’s a gut punch.

“Losing this much revenue this time of year, and then having so many of your workforce and friends and neighbors also struggling, is a lot,” Turner said.

The lack of water is slowing everything down here. Residents haven’t been able to take showers or cook with tap water. Churches, schools and hospitals can’t provide some services. And it’s still not clear when clean water will come back to the entire city.

In response, some businesses and organizations are getting scrappy: They’re digging their own wells.

“When we saw water start gushing out, we literally all started cheering — like it was a really kind of wild moment,” Pastor Andrew Sluder said of a recently dug well at Bible Baptist Church.

The well will serve his community of about 100 after the water is tested and deemed safe for drinking, he said. Church members just couldn’t wait for city water to come back on.

“Because right now, people are practically living off of cases of water,” he explained.

Dozens of business owners and organizations have applied for permits for wells, including Adam Roper. He owns a funeral home in West Asheville.

“We absolutely have to have water to care for the deceased, loved ones in our care, you know — when it comes to bathing and washing hair, but also for embalming,” he said.

And funeral services are essential in the wake of the storm. There have been more than 70 confirmed deaths in the county.

Roper had to get a permit to drill, and connecting the well water costs tens of thousands of dollars. But he said these services and ceremonies are important.

“It’s important to be able to come together and remember, remember a life,” he said.

Until clean water starts flowing through the city again, business owners and city leaders will keep doing whatever they have to do to get by.