North Carolina dam 'holding' for now as authorities sound sirens ...

LAKE LURE, N.C. – Authorities are going house-to-house and urging people below the dam of a popular lake in the western North Carolina mountains to evacuate as officials warn the barrier could be nearing failure.

Relentless rain from what was once Hurricane Helene has resulted in catastrophic flooding from Florida to North Carolina as the storm moves inland across the Southeast.

Rutherford County Emergency Management officials issued a dire warning in a Facebook post Friday to residents near Lake Lure.

"Residents below the Lake Lure Dam need to evacuate to higher ground immediately!!" officials wrote in the post. "Dam failure imminient!! Evacuate to higher ground immediately!!"

By Friday afternoon, officials said that the wall of the dam is currently holding but water from the flooded Broad River is overtopping it and support structures have been compromised.

"Evacuation sirens are sounding downstream of the Dam," officials wrote on Facebook. "Emergency personnel are working with the structural engineers and are ogling house to house to ensure all citizens have been evacuated."

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The National Weather Service issued a Flash Flood Emergency for areas downstream of the dam, including River Creek Campground, Green Hill, Cleghorn and Union.

"Move to higher ground now!" NWS officials wrote in the warning. "This is an extremely dangerous and life-threatening situation. Do not attempt to travel unless you are fleeing an area subject to flooding or under an evacuation order."

Officials said a shelter has been set up at a high school and a church in the town of Ruthefordton, about 20 miles to the southeast of Lake Lure.

All of western North Carolina is under a high risk of flooding Friday, with as much as 20 inches of rain possible in some places before Helene moves away this weekend.

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