Posted on October 26, 2026
By Noe Gonzalez
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers disaster recovery crews have begun removing thousands of tons of Hurricane Helene debris from Jackson Island along the Nolichucky River. Primary contractor DRC Emergency Services LLC is leading the massive cleanup operation along the riverbanks.
During an Oct. 16 site visit, USACE Nashville District leaders met with contractors on Jackson Island to inspect debris cleanup operations. The district is managing the $34.5 million debris-removal mission under an Economy Act interagency agreement with the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service.
“I am incredibly proud of the team,” said Lt. Col. Guillermo Guandique, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Nashville District commander. “This looks like an easy operation only because the contractors put in so much work ahead of time in preparation for this and making sure that they are executing this professionally and efficiently, and most importantly, safely.”
Field teams began clearing debris Sept. 9. Early in the operation, the combined team achieved a monumental breakthrough for eastern Tennessee by locating and respectfully recovering the remains of Nancy Tucker, who disappeared in catastrophic floodwaters from Hurricane Helene two years ago.
To recognize that teamwork, Guandique presented certificates of appreciation to Dylan Davis and Tim Johnson of Mid-Atlantic Tree Service LLC, Matthew Bean of Civil & Environmental Consultants, Inc., Branden Chambers of Washington County, and Johnson City EMS for their careful coordination and site safety during the recovery.
A wooden memorial cross now stands near a quiet grove of trees on the island in Tucker’s honor, marking where recovery teams located her. Addressing the assembled crew, Chambers delivered a message of gratitude directly from her family and neighbors.
“They asked me to do one thing today that was the most important to them… to make sure that everybody understood how appreciative the community is to everyone here in this group and what you all did to bring Miss Tucker home,” said Branden Chambers of Washington County-Johnson City Emergency Medical Services, adding that DRC and Mid-Atlantic have consistently gone above and beyond to support the community.
Even with the recovery of Nancy Tucker complete, equipment operators and federal partners continue working with heightened caution across more than 80 acres of public land in the Cherokee National Forest.
Field personnel follow strict federal workplace safety standards, conducting daily equipment checks and safety briefings before each shift. To protect the terrain, workers lay roughly 1,400 heavy wooden mats along equipment paths. These thick timber mats spread the weight of heavy excavators like snowshoes, preventing soil compaction and shielding buried archaeological deposits beneath layers of river sand and mud. They avoid aggressive digging, maintaining slow, deliberate clearing speeds to protect the sensitive grounds.
“We’re ahead of schedule as far as our debris removal,” said Mark Cardwell, operations manager for DRC Emergency Services. “The big part of this multi-layered mission is that we had the human remains element that was very important to DRC, and the local community. We were fortunate to get that taken care of early on in the process. Once that we’ve got that done, it’s been normal operations, with the exception of the project’s original scope to where we’re at now, we know that’s going to grow, and there’s even more work to do here than what we initially thought, but we’re looking forward to seeing it through to the end and getting the job done.”
Because Jackson Island holds rich cultural history, on-site archaeologists monitor daily operations while operators watch constantly for historic artifacts.
“The whole point is to avoid ground disturbance on this,” said Matthew Bean, bioarcheologist with Civil & Environmental Consultants, Inc. “To have archaeologists on site, not necessarily to do work, but to ensure that if anything does accidentally come up during the cleanup process, we are there to document it and close it off, and they can continue working around that as needed.”
Hauling operations maintain steady, careful progress as specialized self-loading trucks transport broken trees and river wreckage across an 11-mile route to the debris management site (DMS).
“On average, we’re running about six trucks every day,” said Trevor Taylor, project manager for DRC Emergency Services. “Out of those six trucks, they’re doing about 50 loads, total. So, on average, we’re doing anywhere from 2,000 cubic yards to 2,500 cubic yards a day of vegetative debris.”
At the DMS, industrial horizontal grinders reduce clean tree debris at a three-to-one volume reduction ratio. Transport trucks then take the fresh mulch to an adjacent agricultural property for beneficial soil reuse, returning organic nutrients to local farmland.
Subcontractor Thompson Consulting Company monitors every incoming and outgoing load through its electronic Automated Debris Management System, utilizing QR code scans to record and verify debris quantities in real time without paper tickets. To date, crews have cleared more than 80,000 cubic yards of storm debris safely from the corridor.
“The debris comes off the island, comes through here, it gets processed, reduced, compacted, and then it goes to its final destination.” said Kevin Parker, debris monitoring manager for Thompson Consulting Services. “Our job is to quantify the debris,” Parker stated. “We have brought in approximately 80,000 cubic yards of vegetation since the project began a little over a month ago, and we’ve processed about 130,000 pounds of hazardous waste. Crews work 12 hours a day from sunup to sundown, seven days a week to get the job done.”
Field crews carefully isolate household hazardous items, construction materials, and white goods from clean wood. DRC personnel have safely gathered and processed roughly 2,000 pounds per day, including propane tanks, chemical barrels, and creosote railroad ties.
Crews extract abandoned household appliances, safely drain refrigerants, and deliver scrap metal to commercial recyclers.
As the multi-layered cleanup moves closer to completion, federal oversight remains a constant presence on the island to ensure long-term environmental restoration.
“We continue to provide oversight on this project with our quality assurance personnel on site and are grateful to be able to help the local community get public lands back to what they need to be,” said Nathaniel Brock, USACE project manager.
About Us
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Nashville District delivers engineering solutions, with our partners, to secure our Nation, strengthen our economy, and reduce disaster risk. USACE is engineering solutions to the nation’s toughest challenges while safely delivering quality projects on schedule and within budget.
Nashville District manages critical water resources infrastructure across the Cumberland and Tennessee River basins in a seven-state region. The district delivers navigation, flood risk management, hydropower, recreation, environmental stewardship, water supply support, regulatory oversight, and emergency response while operating dams in the Cumberland River Basin and maintaining navigation lock projects on the Cumberland and Tennessee River systems. Through this work, the district helps protect communities, support commerce, generate renewable energy, and improve quality of life.
The public can obtain news, updates and information from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Nashville District on the district’s website at https://www.lrd.usace.army.mil/About/Districts/Nashville-District/, on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/nashvillecorps and on X (formerly Twitter) at http://www.x.com/nashvillecorps. Follow us on LinkedIn for the latest Nashville District employment and contracting opportunities at https://www.linkedin.com/company/u-s-army-corps-of-engineers-nashville-district.
