Dennis blows by, heads back

DENNIS - Storm of ‘99 September 1, 1999 The Beaufort News

Dennis Blows By, Heads Back

Hurricane Dennis – now Tropical Storm Dennis- has kept residents on edge for more than a week, and it looks like the season’s fourth named storm is going to stick around a while longer.

In fact, forecasters said this morning the finicky tropical system is likely to put a damper on the upcoming Labor Day weekend, traditionally a big-business end to tourist season.

After brushing the coastline Monday and sending flood waters into several down east communities before moving offshore, the storm lost its steering currents and began drifting back this way Tuesday afternoon.

Members of the county’s control group met last night and again warned residents of low-lying areas, particularly those with north-facing shorelines, to seek shelter. Atlantic Elementary School and West Carteret High School opened last night for evacuees and provided hot meals for the weary. But that meant public schools were closed for students yet another day.

“It has significantly decreased in strength overnight, and stalled this morning about 125 miles east of Hatteras,” Mike Addertion, co-ordinator for the county Emergency Management Office said this morning. “It’s still projected to come back, just south of Cape Lookout, but the reliability of those projections is unclear. We are going to wait until late today or early Thursday to decide what schools will do Thursday.”

He said the far eastern parts of the county might get gale-force winds, but if the storm stays on its present track, the strongest winds won’t arrive until Thursday morning.

“There is still the possibility it will track to the northwest and not have much effect on us at all,” Mr. Addertion said. “If anything, it will be mostly a wind and tide event.”

Down East – Cedar Island, a fishing village of 350 about 50 miles northeast of Morehead City, was especially hard hit. Other down east communities took their share of the blow as well, but got off mostly with downed trees, minor flooding, missing roof shingles and loss of electricity. Two nursing homes in Sea Level, Taylor Hospital and Extended Care and The Sailor’s Snug Harbor, weathered the storm well and didn’t evacuate patients.

No injuries were reported, but unofficial reports had at least 15 island homes damaged by tidewater, and many others with varying degrees of wind damage.

Sustained 100-mph winds battered the island for part of Monday, uprooting many trees and collapsing a cinder block structure on the island fishing dock.

“The whole ground shook,” said Randy Goodwin, who works at the dock for fish dealer Clayton Fulcher. “It was just luck nobody was under the roof when the walls caved in,” he added.

Since the tidewater came from the north, the lower end of the island - which is also the lowest – was flooded the worst.

Gloria Emory said water in front of her home on Highway 12 rose quickly and covered News-Times newspaper tubes along the road, nearly 5 feet high.

There was extensive shoreline erosion along Cedar Island Bay on the east side of the island, and many bulkheads were damaged.

Farther up Highway 12, Alvah Goodwin and son, Marty, were removing soaked carpets from their home and stacking furniture on the deck Tuesday while airing the house.

Nearby, Ronald and Becky Goodwin sat in their home and recounted how their son, Henry, a county magistrate, found a snake, a blue crab and school of

minnows floating in their flooded garage. “I think there were even some jumping mullets in there,” Ronald Goodwin said.

For many hours, Cedar island was inaccessible by motor vehicle because the 8mile stretch of Highway 12 running through Great Marsh was underwater.

Electricity and phone services went out about 8 a.m. Monday and weren’t restored until early Tuesday afternoon.

Despite the harsh weather of the day before, mosquitoes swarmed about the island making clean up efforts that much less pleasant.