Beacon Veterinary Hospital – Our Story
On Thursday, September 26th, 2024, the staff of Beacon Veterinary Hospital completed the day’s work early and left our building at 1 pm, as the rain was coming in ahead of Hurricane Helene. The hurricane had yet to make landfall in Florida, but it was preceded in the Western North Carolina Mountains by 48 hours of steady, heavy, ground-saturating rain. On the morning of the 27th, as Helene made her arrival, Dr. Johansson logged in at 7 am to the security cameras and saw some water approaching in the backyard. By 7:05 am, the cameras and power went dark at Beacon.
Those were the final moments of our sweet little animal hospital, created in 2009 in a former bank building in the heart of Beacon Village in Swannanoa, NC. When the Swannanoa River flooded that day, the waters reached as high as 7 feet inside the building, washed out the doors and windows, and crumbled the interior walls, cabinets, laboratory equipment, etc., along with every object in the building. We lost every bit of our equipment in the toxic sludge, including our digital dental and radiography machines, a portable ultrasound unit, and our complete stock of medications and preventative care products.
No animals were present in the hospital, and fortunately, our entire staff is currently safe, although our lives have been disrupted well beyond the destruction of our workplace.
The entire Swannanoa community was ravaged by the storm, and the rebuilding work that has begun will likely take years, possibly a decade or more to complete. Our hospital will rebuild, we hope at the original site. However, seeing the damage to the area—erosion surrounds the building, and severe damage to the roadways and infrastructure—we had to seek a temporary facility outside of our “home” in Swannanoa.
We appreciate the community’s support to our hospital and staff as we begin the healing and rebuilding. Hope to see you soon back on Whitson Avenue.