Do you remember what you were doing one year ago today?
Residents of Hatteras and Ocracoke islands do. They remember all too well.
One year ago today, we were glued to our televisions screens and listening to our weather radios. The monstrous Hurricane Irene was making its way across the Atlantic Ocean, and the bull?s eye in the ?cone of terror,? as one friend calls it, was North Carolina.
At all of the island?s gathering places ? grocery stores, post offices, banks, and restaurants ? we asked everyone we met, ?Are you going or staying??
This was forecast to be a big one, maybe THE big one. It had the attention of all of us ? even many of us who have never evacuated before.
While talk of whether or not to evacuate is common before hurricanes, there was much more this time and in much more serious tones.
We were all getting calls from family and friends, urging us to leave, and, indeed, the forecasts were dire.
Many of us did leave, but many did not.
I promised my family I would decide on Friday morning, Aug. 26. By then, the storm was weakening somewhat. I did not leave and I wrote about ?Why some of us stay in the face of a major hurricane? on my blog that evening.
We started getting rain bands from the storm on Friday afternoon, and the wind began picking up.
The storm made landfall on Saturday morning, Aug. 27, about 7:30 a.m. near Cape Lookout. It passed over the barrier islands and then turned north, heading up the Pamlico Sound. By 8:30 that morning, the wind was shaking my house pretty good, and there were a few ear-splitting noises as the walls and the roof creaked and groaned in the gusts.
It let up a bit Saturday afternoon and then in the late early evening, as the center passed us by to west, the wind shifted and the water in the Pamlico Sound that had been blown toward the mainland began rushing back toward us.
The hurricane itself wasn?t much worse or any scarier than most of the others. Where I live in Frisco, the storm surge was about as high as it had been in Hurricane Earl, the year before.
However, in the northern villages of Avon, Rodanthe, Waves, and Salvo ? and some areas of northern Dare County — the surge was catastrophic, up to 10 to 12 feet of water.
I won?t go into any details of the storm?s aftermath because Island Free Press reporter, Anne Bowers, has done such as masterful job of that in her two-part reporter?s notebook that appears on The Features Page, along with other stories about recovery on Hatteras and Ocracoke.
?Hurricane Irene will be remembered for the two distinct inlets, multiple dune breaches, unprecedented soundside flooding, tenuous electricity, and evacuees who couldn?t return home,? Bowers wrote in an article that was published on this site the week after the storm.
She pretty well nailed it.
However, no one was injured in the storm.
The Island Free Press kept posting articles through the storm and its aftermath, but for several days, it was a challenge.
I stayed here in my office, posting updates by computer and then by dictating it over the phone until I couldn?t anymore. By early Saturday, the power was out, and by late Saturday night, neither cell phones nor landlines were working.
Donna Barnett, the IFP webmaster and graphic designer, had evacuated to Raleigh with her husband and daughter. There she opened the IFP?s first Raleigh Bureau and posted from her hotel room.
Anne Bowers and her husband, Don, the newspaper?s photographer, also stayed. They had a generator to keep their phones and laptops charged and ingeniously found a hot spot for wi-fi in the parking lot of the Cape Hatteras Electric Cooperative. They started sending articles to Donna on Sunday.
I may be the editor, but I didn?t get to edit stories again until late on Tuesday. That was very unsettling. Everything was sent directly to Donna, she read it over, and posted it. But it all worked out fine, thanks to our small band of professionals.
When I was finally able to get on the website again, I was pretty proud of and happy with their work. Then we all worked around the clock ? or so it seemed ? for another couple months.
We could not have had the fine coverage that we did in Island Free Press without the dynamic duo of Don and Anne. They were on the road to the tri-villages almost every day for the next six weeks, covering the damage and aftermath with stories and photographs.
They made friends with transportation workers, contractors, first responders, and other news sources and had terrific access to the areas they needed to reach to do the job.
They were also ingenious.
On Sept. 2, just five days after the storm, they got the first news photographs from the ground at the new inlet on Pea Island. Until then, there had been only aerial photos and video.
The couple packed their bikes in the back of their truck, drove to the first inlet at northern Rodanthe, waited until low tide, and discreetly waded across the narrow inlet, holding their bikes overhead. Then they biked the five miles or so to the much bigger inlet on Pea Island, got their story and photos, and got back before high tide.
Now that?s what I call going the extra mile ? or five miles ? to bring news to the public.
They may be news junkies and they may love the rush of covering a storm, but Don and Anne also really cared about getting the news out to the residents, the evacuees who couldn?t get back, the non-resident property owners, and Hatteras lovers everywhere. We were the only news team operating on the island, and they took that responsibility very seriously.
Anne mentioned today that the one thing she didn?t have time to write about was the stress from this hurricane. And I and others agree with her that it was much more stressful than most others.
We had the stress of waiting for the storm, riding it out or watching from afar if you evacuated. It was well over a week before you could get back if you evacuated, while you worried about water damage to your home or business.
Most or many in the tri-villages and Avon had the stress of catastrophic damage to their houses, possessions, and businesses. In many cases, they had no place to live, no place to cook and no food, no shampoo or toothpaste or toothbrush, and maybe only the clothes on their back. Dealing with insurance and rebuilding are no picnic.
However, there was plenty of stress to go around, and life had changed for the time being for those of us on southern Hatteras and Ocracoke also.
Highway 12 was cut by two inlets north of Rodanthe. We had a temporary ferry from Rodanthe to Stumpy Point, which took two and a half hours ? or more if you ran aground ? each way. The ferries were crowded with emergency workers, supply trucks, and the equipment needed for repairing the road. A trip off the island for anything was so stressful that many of us didn?t do it.
There were no tourists for weeks. When they finally arrived in a trickle a few weeks after the storm to southern Hatteras Island only, they had to come from the mainland by two ferries and through Ocracoke. They couldn?t get ferry reservations. They were unhappy. Business owners and employees suffered an economic punch that many have still not recovered from.
Cape Hatteras Electric Company did a terrific job, but we had emergency or tenuous power for weeks when it came back on. Even now, Anne Bowers says she has a moment of panic when the power blinks for a moment. Have the power poles fallen into the inlet?
We worry about our temporary bridge over Pea Island Inlet even in minor storms. Will it be okay or will the bridge or the highway be damaged?
It was a glorious day when Highway 12 reopened on Oct. 10. Many of us took a road trip as soon as we could just to do it and see the new little bridge.
However, the stress did not let up into the holidays and the winter, as folks continued to deal with physical and economic destruction.
It was not a happy day when an ?I? storm formed earlier this week in the Atlantic. It looks unlikely that Isaac will be a threat to us. However, there are many more to come before the hurricane season ends.
As always, we have all witnessed terrific community spirit and tremendous generosity from islanders and off-islanders during the recovery from Hurricane Irene.
We are now, and always will be, resilient people. That?s a comfort.
I hope you enjoy our package of articles looking back on Hurricane Irene after a year.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Click here to read more Island Free Press articles on Hurricane Irene.