Early in the last week of September, it began to look as if a coastal storm was brewing for the last weekend of the month.
That made me more anxious than usual. Coastal storms are not usually life-threatening, but they sure can be a nuisance with high winds, pounding waves, and ocean overwash. In addition, we had already had a good bit of northeast winds during the month to get the ocean riled up and really didn’t need more.
On Tuesday morning of that week, Sept. 22, I reluctantly wrote a news story for The Island Free Press to say that the National Weather Service had issued a high surf advisory for the Outer Banks, north of Cape Hatteras. Not good news. And I say “reluctantly” because I always hate posting that first storm story since it usually means more days of coverage — and stormy weather — to come.
It had started raining on Monday that week, and it rained just about every day — drizzly, wind-blown rain. The wind blew harder each day. Ferries ran only intermittently to Ocracoke.
Next came the coastal flood advisory on Thursday.
I was really feeling badly for our visitors who had been so looking forward to their vacations. The week was quickly becoming a washout.
However, I was also worried about getting off Hatteras Island on Sunday afternoon to get to Edenton, where I had hip replacement surgery scheduled for bright and early Monday morning, Sept. 28. It had been planned for six weeks. My hip was in bad shape, and I was barely limping around. I was more than ready to put the surgery behind me.
It rained and it blew and the ocean hurled waves over the dunes in north Buxton on Saturday evening. But, the sun came out on Sunday morning, and I left here on Sunday, as planned, with my good friend, GeeGee Rosell.
That was a close call, but it had worked out just fine. It seems like I vaguely remember hearing something about another potential coastal storm the following weekend, but, I thought, I’d be home by then and it would be no big deal.
Surgery went well, and later on Monday, I found the weather channel on the television in my hospital room. The forecasters were talking about a tropical depression or some storm, but I didn’t pay much attention.
By Tuesday morning, the depression was Hurricane Joaquin and was potentially a threat to the North Carolina coast. Still a long way to go, I thought, as I focused most of my energy on getting out of the hospital bed and trekking the hallways in my walker. I was ready to go home.
I was being released on Wednesday, and there was a lot of talk in the hospital about the storm that could bring wind and rain to eastern North Carolina by the weekend. Even over in Edenton, they don’t take hurricanes for granted, especially not after Isabel in 2003.
My daughter, who had flown into Norfolk and rented a car, drove me home from the hospital in warm, muggy, cloudy weather. We arrived in Frisco and were met by Dare County Emergency Medical Services and two guys who confidently strapped me to their lift chair and carried me up a flight of steps.
Then we turned on the evening news, and I was horrified. Hurricane Joaquin by then was forecast to become a major storm — a Category 3, maybe a 4, and Cape Hatteras was dead in the center of the “cone of uncertainty.”
I shouldn’t — but will — say that I have never in 24 years evacuated in a storm, though I have certainly considered it. I didn’t intend to stay for a Category 3 or 4 storm taking aim on the Cape. However, I could barely walk and was in a good deal of pain and couldn’t even imagine having to pack up and evacuate — right after finally arriving home.
My daughter was staying pretty calm, considering everything, but I was feeling like I wanted to throw up. It was a really bad feeling for 24 or more hours — until late Thursday night when the “cone” began to shift to the east.
It kept right on shifting until Joaquin was headed way, way out in the ocean! What wonderful news for all of us on the islands!
Before the surgery, I had prepared several stories for posting earlier last week, but I was hoping to take the rest of last week and the weekend off from work — just rest and recover.
That didn’t happen. Friday, I took the weather coverage back from Nags Head reporter Catherine Kozak, who had been helping out while I was gone.
Joaquin was headed out of the picture, but another coastal low pressure was preparing to bring wind, coastal flooding, and record rainfall to the southeast — totally unrelated to the hurricane.
From Friday until Monday, the rain came down in sheets at times, blown sideways by the northeast wind. Between Friday, Sept. 25, and Tuesday, Oct. 6, more than 17 inches of rain fell on Hatteras.
The wind was gusting only into the 30s, which normally wouldn’t even get much notice around the islands. However, the ocean, already whipped up by days and days of persistent northeast winds, began pouring over the dunes in places. Huge waves, made larger by some southeast swell from the distant hurricane, pounded the dunes, flattening 340 feet of them on north Ocracoke.
The Pamlico Sound began filling up with water — rainwater and ocean water pushed in through the inlets — that had no place to go. Water levels were rising along the sound in places where the water usually is blown out by a northeast wind.
By Tuesday, the storm was winding down — the rain finally ceased, the wind slowly stopped whipping, the flooding gradually subsided.
The initial estimate, announced today by Dare County, is that the storm caused $591,000 in damage to 51 structures in the county. Most of the damage was in Buxton — $423,000.
Highway 12 on Hatteras was never closed, though the overwash got serious in north Buxton.
We were very fortunate here on the islands — certainly compared to the folks in the Bahamas who were beat up by Joaquin for days or those in South Carolina, where the flooding was deadly. We dodged the bullet, as so many folks noted.
You can read all about the storm and see many photos during the siege and in the aftermath on The Island Free Press Local News Page.
We didn’t have a hurricane. Before it was apparent that we would not, Hyde County decided to evacuate visitors from Ocracoke on Thursday, Oct. 1 and kept them off the island for a week during the storm. Dare County’s Emergency Control Group met twice — on Thursday and Friday last week — but did not evacuate. Both actions worked out for the better.
We did, however, have a coastal storm that could have been devastating, especially if Highway 12 had been damaged by the rampaging ocean.
We all usually do some “Monday-morning quarterbacking” after hurricanes and other storms, so it seems fair to do it in this case. And I thought the local, state, and federal agencies we depend on in these times did a great job.
And, even though the control group in Dare County was not activated, the communication during the storm was terrific.
The county’s public information department sent out releases late last week, and Emergency Management, under the leadership of a new director, Drew Pearson, did a great job — before and after the storm.
The Dare County Local Emergency Planning Committee met on Wednesday night, Sept. 30, and Pearson was there. He directed sending emergency supplies to the villages and their fire departments ahead of the storm, among other preparations.
On Monday morning — the morning of the potentially most damaging high tide — Pearson got up at 4 a.m. to drive from Manteo to Hatteras village and back to report on road conditions.
I was impressed. I was up early to check the roads for my daughter’s trip back to the Norfolk Airport. The high tide had been about 2 a.m. and it was still too dark to see much on the webcams. There wasn’t an early update by DOT on its Facebook or travel page. Dare County Communications reported that the road was open with standing water and sand in places, but I wanted more information. I called Pearson’s cell phone and got the word straight from him.
Hyde County also kept the news releases coming — with lots of information on conditions on both Ocracoke and the mainland.
As always, the N.C. Department of Transportation did a terrific job of keeping Highway 12 on Hatteras open — pushing sand and water off the road after high tide for many days and cleaning up afterward. On Ocracoke, DOT crews pushed up an emergency berm after the dunes were flattened last Friday night, and then did it again before the highway on the island reopened yesterday.
The National Park Service’s new leadership was also being tested by this storm — the first since Superintendent David Hallac arrived last January.
I thought the Park Service put out much more information than it usually does during the events of the past week or two — both before, during, and after the storm. Staff members on the ground were sending photos to Manteo of conditions during the storm and public affairs specialist Cyndy Holda was forwarding them to local officials and reporters.
In addition, Buxton maintenance staff member Doug Blackmon called me early on Tuesday morning to say that he thought some folks didn’t understand the extent of the flooding and why some park roads and ramps were closed. He told me about the flooding on seashore lands in Buxton and volunteered to take Island Free Press photographer Don Bowers out to get photos of the worst flooding.
Bowers did get out that day with new Hatteras Island district ranger, Joe Darling — both men in waders to get a good look at the flooding. Click here to read a story and see the slide show.
The Park Service also did a great job keeping its Cape Hatteras National Seashore Facebook page updated.
Last, but certainly not least, the local National Weather Service office in Morehead City, did its usual top-notch job of communicating with the public and talking to public officials and the media.
The Weather Service has a terrific website for the public at www.weather.gov/mhx. There were also morning and evening weather summaries going to emergency managers, the media, and other officials, along with twice daily webinars and conference calls.
Whenever I call the office to ask questions for a weather story, the meteorologists who answer the phone are invariably well-informed and patient — even if they are swamped — and this storm was no exception.
The only thing I might wish for in the future is more timely reports on road conditions — especially after each high tide — from DOT and from Dare County.
Thanks to all of you who kept the information coming and the roads open. And thanks to our visitors, most of whom seemed to make the very best of their soggy, breezy vacations.
