A stretch of Interstate 40 through the western North Carolina mountains is reopening to traffic this weekend, months after Hurricane Helene’s historic flooding collapsed portions of the road.

It will cost $60 billion for North Carolina to recover from Hurricane Helene, according to the latest state estimate. “The challenges in relation to this are so enormous,” Thomas Chandler, deputy director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at Columbia University,

Part of Interstate 40 in the North Carolina mountains will open this weekend, months after it was closed following the devastation brought by Hurricane Helene in September. Sections of I-40 near the North Carolina-Tennessee line sustained major damage from the storm,