‘This is as bad as I’ve ever seen it’ – Buxton Beach severely damaged after recent storm
Photos by Don Bowers
Photographer Don Bowers has been documenting storms in the northern Buxton Beach area for decades. After visiting the shoreline on Wednesday, March 27, he stated that this week’s low pressure system caused more damage than he has seen since he moved to Hatteras Island in the mid-1960s.
“In the 1970s, we had two big nor’easters that came through and pummeled the Buxton area, but we didn’t have as many houses back then,” he said. “This is as bad as I’ve ever seen it.”
Other areas of Hatteras Island were not as severely affected by the storm, but northern Buxton has had multiple cycles of oceanside flooding since Monday, March 25.
The damage stretches from the northern Buxton borders to the now-closed Buxton Beach Access at the end of Old Lighthouse Road.
Bowers reported that at least a dozen septic tanks have been recently exposed. There are six exterior staircases that have been washed away from homes, multiple broken water pipes, and extensive piles of debris. Many side streets in the area remain flooded, while the pilings of oceanfront homes are submerged in ocean waters, with no way to access the residences without powering through chest-high waves.

At the site of the former Navy and Coast Guard military base, which has been an area of constant concern since petroleum smells and sheens started appearing in the fall of 2023, the storm has accelerated the already-critical pollution issues.
Former remnants of concrete buildings, pipes and cables have been a regular sight since two offshore hurricanes brushed the Outer Banks in early September 2023, but in recent days, the extensive mess of decades-old has overtaken the beach.
As of Wednesday, March 27, more infrastructure along the shoreline has been uncovered, and the petroleum smell has returned, permeating the area and spreading to nearby neighborhoods “I’ve been out there many times, and it smelled bad today – worse than it ever has before.” said Bowers. “I could smell it a half mile away.”
Cape Hatteras National Seashore personnel expanded the size of the closed beach area near the Buxton Beach Access on Sunday, and a revised Precautionary Public Health Advisory was issued for the area on Monday.
The Outer Banks may get a brief and minor respite after days of strong northeast winds, elevated surf and accelerated erosion, but a second low pressure system is expected to impact the Outer Banks starting late Wednesday night.
Additional erosion is expected in the next several days, and N.C. Highway 12 may be impacted in northern Buxton and other areas with vulnerable and compromised dunes.
For more information
- Visitors who encounter a fuel smell or fuel sheens while visiting the Buxton shoreline near Old Lighthouse Road should call the National Response Center at 1-800-424-8802 to report the encounter. Include the date, time, location, and basic details of what was seen or smelled, and do not call if you have not experienced the issue first-hand, or have not been physically affected. The National Response Center is solely for reporting real-time information on fuel smells or sheens in the Buxton area, as they happen.
- For more information on a recently launched campaign to initiate action on Buxton Beach, click here.
- To learn more about the current conditions on Buxton Beach, visit the Cape Hatteras National Seashore’s webpage, or review the Island Free Press’ previous reports on the situation.










