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Hurricane Helene is now the deadliest storm since Katrina. On Wednesday, 182 deaths were confirmed in six southeastern states.

Most deaths were reported in North Carolina, where there was devastating flooding caused by swelling rivers, debris and landslides, as well as in South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Tennessee and Virginia.

More deaths are expected to be reported in North Carolina in the coming days. There were 39 deaths in South Carolina, where power was still out for 449,000 people.

“The current data we have suggests that up to 600 people could lose their lives,” Homeland Security Advisor Liz Sherwood-Randall warned on Monday. “But we have no confirmation of this. We know there are 600 who are either lost or missing.”

She warned that the numbers “fluctuate greatly” and that there are “many reports that do not agree with the numbers.”

Joe Biden traveled to Raleigh, North Carolina on Wednesday to meet with first responders and others affected by Helene. Officials said the president had waited to travel there until it was clear his presence would not disrupt rescue efforts.

Biden praised North Carolina’s Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper and South Carolina’s Republican Gov. Henry McMaster for their responses to the storm and said that after disasters, “we put politics aside.” “No one can deny the impacts of the climate crisis anymore,” Biden said, adding: “The storms are getting stronger.”

The devastation was particularly severe in the Blue Ridge Mountains, where at least 57 people died in and around Asheville, North Carolina, a tourist haven known for its art galleries, breweries and outdoor activities. “Communities have been wiped off the map,” Cooper said at a news conference Tuesday.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster announced that the number of confirmed deaths from the storm in his state rose to 36 as of Tuesday afternoon.

Among the dead were Marcia and Jerry Savage, 74 and 78 respectively, who were found hugging each other in bed after being killed by a fallen tree that destroyed their home. Her grandson, John Savage, 22, who found her, told the Associated Press it was likely his grandfather turned to protect his wife shortly before her death.

Dozens of other South Carolinians died in similar circumstances after trees fell on homes or cars. Among the dead are two South Carolina firefighters who died when a tree fell on their truck.

Elsewhere, Tennessee state authorities said Wednesday they are investigating the company that owns a plastics factory where 11 workers were swept away by flooding after the Impact Plastics factory continued operating in Erwin, a small community in rural Tennessee could.

Several claimed they were not allowed to leave on time to avoid the storm’s effects. Only when water flooded the parking lot and the power went out was the plant closed and workers sent home. Of the eleven ships that were swept away, only five could be saved. Two of them are presumed dead.

Thousands of federal forces have been deployed to respond to the destruction caused by the storm, and hundreds of people are missing in all six states.

A Facebook group with more than 477,000 members included posts from people looking for family members. Some also provided updates saying their relatives had been found.

Helene made landfall last Thursday as a Category 4 storm in Big Bend, Florida, before moving up the East Coast. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) noted that a 15-foot storm surge had hit Florida’s Taylor County – with winds of 140 mph – and that areas of western North Carolina recorded 29 inches of rain as the storm over the region came to a standstill.

Helene is the second most severe hurricane to hit the continental United States since Hurricane Katrina made landfall in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana on August 29, 2005. The Category 5 storm killed nearly 1,400 people.

In 2022, Hurricane Ian was responsible for 156 deaths in Florida, North Carolina and Virginia.

A consortium of scientists confirmed this week that the human-caused climate crisis helped make Helene a much stronger and wetter storm.

A report from ClimaMeter, which analyzes extreme weather events, found that rainfall was up to 20 percent heavier and winds were up to 7 percent stronger in Helene.

The consortium found that increased sea temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico – which climate scientists have been warning about for years – likely contributed to Helene’s power.

In conversation with CBS Face the nationShe said rising temperatures in the Gulf led to conditions that caused “significant infrastructure damage” that affected a multistate area.

“It took a while for this storm to develop, but then it strengthened very quickly – and that’s because of the warm waters in the Gulf, which are producing more storms that reach this large category,” she said, adding , that conditions were favorable for larger storm surges in coastal areas and more precipitation as the storms moved further north.

“Historically, hurricane damage has been primarily wind damage, but now we’re seeing a lot more water damage, and that’s a result of warm water, which is a result of climate change,” she said.