“Surviving—That Was the Mission”: Chris and Kelly Janson Share Experience of Flying Supplies to Hurricane Helene Victims [Exclusive]

Chris Janson and his wife, Kelly, didn’t wait for a break in their schedule to help the East Tennessee/West North Carolina victims of Hurricane Helene. Chris Janson played a show in Massachusetts on Sunday. But when Kelly started seeing videos of the hurricane/flooding devastation on social media, she organized a humanitarian trip. She had them, their young son, an airplane, and a flatbed truck full of supplies on the ground in East Tennessee the next day.

“Those people don’t care about meeting a celebrity right now,” Kelly said. “They care about just having water and surviving. That was the mission. It’s hard to go out and be excited about playing country music knowing that the other part of our country is in such turmoil.”

Six days after Hurricane Helene made landfall in Florida, rendering extensive damage and moving up the coast, slamming into George and landlocked towns hundreds of miles deep in East Tennessee and West North Carolina, 176 people are dead from the storm, and countless others are missing.

Chris Janson Saw Barefoot Children, Blue Tarps Hiding Devastation

“After seeing the devastation on social media and feeling helpless we wanted to get there as soon as possible and get water to them,” Chris said. “It was heartwarming to see the generosity in the area and the churches that have been there for the people in this community.”

On Wednesday, President Biden ordered the Pentagon to deploy up to 1,000 active-duty troops to assist with aid efforts after Hurricane Helene. Deploying from Fort Liberty in Fayetteville, N.C., the soldiers will join more than 6,000 National Guard members and 4,800 federal aid workers already working in the hurricane-ravaged areas of the Southeast.

However, when Kelly snapped into action earlier this week, there was no visibility to federal aid or military help. She couldn’t sleep and told her husband they had to do something. He agreed.
The next day, she got an airplane, went shopping for supplies and Chris called the Sevierville, Tennessee, branch of his sponsor Bass Pro Shop and asked for help. Kelly contacted local East Tennessee government officials to find out what supplies people needed and where they could land the airplane. Cocke County, Tennessee, representative Jeremy Faison directed Kelly to a church.

“I said, ‘I want to try to get as far and as close to the destruction as possible,’” Kelly said. “Chris, he didn’t blink an eye. He said, ‘Yep, let’s do it.’ And, so, we loaded up the kids.”

Kelly Janson Asked Government Officials Where to Land the Airplane

Chris added: “Bass ProSo jumped on board, and they’re a great sponsor of mine. We got some pallets of water and got some non-perishable items, and we took a bunch of stuff over there, a plane full, a flatbed full with a big flatbed behind it and, a full F-150 truck bed and a full-blown suburban. You wish you could do more, but it’s what we could do.”

The Jansons flew into Knoxville, Tennessee, about an hour outside of Newport, Tennessee, rented a car and drove the rest of the way there.

“I couldn’t even believe it,” Kelly said of their drive into the storm zone. “There were one-lane roads, and the destruction is real. It is bad.”

She described seeing overturned trailer homes, barefoot children wandering through their yards and blue tarps draped to hide losses from passersby.

The couple drove the treasure trove of food and supplies to three rural churches that night, and towards the end, a group of people approached them needed food and water.

“It was just really just trying to unload everything and get it there and make sure people had it,” she said, calling it their “hands-on experience.”

“It’s going to take everybody helping,” Kelly said. “People are busy. A lot of stuff is out of sight, out of mind.”

To join the Jansons in donating, visit https://pay.payitgov.com/ncdonations.

(Photo by Scott Legato/Getty Images)