Burner Disaster Response working to help community recover
March 12, 2025
by Moss Brennan The Watauga Democrat (Mar 10, 2025)
Link to the full article here.
WATAUGA — Every morning, at 3 or 4 a.m., Andy Owens wakes up and can’t go back to sleep.
He hears the wind blowing and thinks of those who are living in campers or homes that have been damaged by Hurricane Helene.
“It’s hard for me to feel comfortable sleeping in my warm house when people are out there suffering like that,” Owens said.
Owens is the founder of Burner Disaster Response, which formed in September after Hurricane Helene devastated Western North Carolina.
For a long time, Owens ran a Burning Man food and music camp called Rootpile in the Black Rock Desert of Nevada. According to the organization, Rootpile became one of the most self-sufficient and self-contained large camps at the event.
When Hurricane Helene swept through leaving devastation in its wake, Owens realized that his time, knowledge, skills, and resources could be used to provide responses to the regional disaster using infrastructure belonging to Rootpile.
He started by working with High Country Caregivers to find those who needed help with fixing driveways or clearing debris.
“(I) kind of started making connections with people, and then we had people coming in to help us, and they didn’t have anywhere to go,” Owens said. “They didn’t have anywhere to go. They’re sleeping in their cars and trucks and everything and I can only put so many people in (my) house.”
Some of the work they have done includes debris and fallen tree cleanup, driveway grading, gravel delivery, created a free propane program and works to address other needs as they arise.
He was doing a job in Meat Camp on a farm and he thought it would be cool to have a kind of base camp of sorts for people to stay at when they came to help with recovery efforts.
He said he could build a base camp for people to stay at with one arm tied behind his back.
Owens kept making connections and had a friend who hosted the Amish as they built sheds off the mountain and asked Owens if he wanted to host them up there.
He said of course because he wanted those sheds to come to Watauga County. He expanded the camp to accommodate them and the sheds, but the day they were supposed to arrive, a rainstorm created a muddy pit that wasn’t suitable for building.
Owens was able to partner with Cornerstone Church and have the sheds built there and two of the sheds went to the camp to help house those coming down to help with recovery efforts.
“I thought it was really kind of cool because there’s nobody more conservative than the Amish, and there’s nobody that would be viewed as less conservative than the Burning Man culture, right?” Owens said. “But the reality is both of us are used to doing stuff for each other and pulling together to make something happen.”
Another recent connection was with TM Woodcock Construction. They had plenty of supplies that had been donated to them throughout the storm and connected with Owens to get those to people in need. BDR took those supplies to Hurley, Virginia, which has been hit hard by flooding.
Some of those who have helped Owens have come from other states and stayed here for months.
Dwayne Braithwaite came down from Maryland to help almost four months ago.
“The Lord put on my heart to come so I came,” Braithwaite said.
Owens wants BDR to grow into a force that can be deployed for other disasters, following in the footsteps of Burners without Borders, another Burning Man community aid program.
“To me, mutual aid is a way to go. We’re helping each other, and we’re not counting on the government,” Owens said. “Study mutual aid, and let’s help each other. That’s what we’re going to have to do. Let’s pull together and help each other.”
For more information, visit www.burnerdisasterresponse.org/copy-of-home.
To help fund BDR’s mission, visit www.gofundme.com/f/burner-disaster-response.