Maggie Valley couple opens home for neighbors to connect to outside world.
The welcome sign in front of the Maggie Valley home of Jeff and Caitlin Nichols was still up 11 days after Hurricane Helene ravaged the region.
But this was not your ordinary welcome sign. Instead, it read: “Free Wi-Fi” while listing the network name and password for the couple’s Starlink satellite system.
The Nichols’ welcome extended far from their own dead-end street about a mile up off of Soco Road. The couple put out numerous signs saying “Free Wi-Fi” on street signs directing people to their home.
In the days following the storm, “the most we had at one time was 10 or 12 people,” Caitlin said. “There were people checking in with family, people checking in at their work.”
“It was pretty solid the first few days,” Jeff added. “… We had a lot of people here on Oct. 1 because they had bills to pay.”
Sandra Rowland lives within walking distance of the Nichols and said using the couple’s internet in the days following the storm was a “Godsend.”
“Communicating is our life blood,” Rowland said. “I’m dependent, we all our, on social networks. Just to be able to communicate, to say you are alright, to hear, ‘Do you need anything?’ was a Godsend. They (Nichols) welcomed everyone.”
The couple had as many as 50 different neighbors making a connection to the internet at one point before most of those people had their own internet restored over a week after the storm hit.
Some arrived by car, but many made the journey by foot.
“Some people came on four-wheelers as well,” Caitlin said.
As good hosts do, the Nichols tried to make their neighbors welcome by putting out lawn chairs and erecting a canvas tarp for some protection from the elements.
The Nichols live in Maggie Valley seasonally, spending nine months out of the year working outside the country. They were scheduled to arrive back at their home for their three-month stay the day the storm hit. But they were delayed by Helene, arriving two days later on Sunday, Sept. 29.
The couple were in Mississippi visiting Jeff’s family in the days before Helene came ashore. Jeff called Maggie Valley neighbors after the storm moved on and learned that people had power, but no one had internet.
So the couple stopped at a Best Buy in Mississippi and bought a Starlink system. They also brought a generator, loaded their vehicle with jerry cans of extra fuel and plenty of food and water to bring with them from Mississippi.
“We didn’t want to be a drain on local resources,” Caitlin said.
Jeff Nichols acted as tech guru for some of his neighbors.
“We showed a lot of older people how to turn on Wi-Fi calling,” he said.
