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Good Beach Nourishment News - Hatteras Island



By: Bentmtn
6/18/2022 5:35 PM

That's great news! The earlier the better for some of those beautiful oceanfront homes in Avon. I'm sure the homeowners are celebrating this good news.

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By: bosoxtodd
6/18/2022 9:51 PM

Not sure if the homeowners are celebrating. They get their rent either way. Some renters are celebrating. And some renters will be pissed.

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By: Bentmtn
6/21/2022 10:54 PM

I respectfully disagree with you.
I think I would be happy if my pool wasn't washed by the beach during a nor'Easter. I'm not sure if you have seen pics of the devastation of the homes on Ocean View drive, but the homes and even the homes on the second tier back near the food lion have been devastated over the past couple of years. They cannot rent them in that condition. Sure...it's a pain to have the nourishment going on during rental high season, but it's the only time it can be done. They have lost so much money and have lost rentals. We know people who own there. But the ocean will be the ocean and they are paying higher taxes for a fix right now.

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By: Bentmtn
6/21/2022 11:09 PM

Just one example.



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By: B_Pur
6/22/2022 10:27 AM

I'll be on Ocean View, not OF, 6/24 - 7/4 and the nourishment started south of us and is heading south. Was there in the end of May and the beach was disappearing. Can't come soon enough although it is really to protect RT 12.
I know an OF owner who averages $40k a year in sand to keep the ocean back. Pretty sure he is celebrating.

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By: Fossilridge
6/22/2022 10:56 AM

Not sure if the homeowners are celebrating. They get their rent either way. Some renters are celebrating. And some renters will be pissed.

bosoxtodd


??? This nourishment is saving their home from the same fate as those in Rodanthe, and should reduce/eliminate over wash onto 12 (at last for a little while). Why wouldn't they be celebrating? Not all homeowners rent their home!

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By: NightOwl
6/22/2022 5:38 PM

But the ocean will be the ocean and they are paying higher taxes for a fix right now.

Bentmtn


Sorry, but beach nourishment isn't a fix. It's a patch. It's a patch that lasts 1-5 years, and really has little effect on the danger to homes on the ocean.

What nourishment is designed to do is to extend the beach out into the ocean. Without that beach, we'd have no tourists. A deep beach that rises gently also has some effect on the roughness/force of the waves, which is important for preservation of the dunes. But make no mistake, it's ultimately dunes that protect the oceanfront homes, not the beach itself unless you're really far back, as the Rodanthe houses once were.

Sometimes nourishment uses part of the sand to build up the front of the dunes. But the ocean doesn't have to go over the top of the dunes to cause damage. If it undercuts the dunes, it will take them out completely. To provide good protection, dunes need to be engineered.

The last go round on rebuilding the dunes in Kitty Hawk has been very successful because they're not just sand. The base of the dunes are bladders full of sand and rocks, so they don't get undercut.

If you notice the photos from Rodanthe, the houses that the ocean took were not protected by anything. In the photo you provide, the gaps in the dunes indicate overwash and under-cutting. Hard to say how much vegetation was growing on them. Not enough obviously.

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By: Bentmtn
6/22/2022 5:55 PM

But the ocean will be the ocean and they are paying higher taxes for a fix right now.

Bentmtn


Sorry, but beach nourishment isn't a fix. It's a patch. It's a patch that lasts 1-5 years, and really has little effect on the danger to homes on the ocean.

What nourishment is designed to do is to extend the beach out into the ocean. Without that beach, we'd have no tourists. A deep beach that rises gently also has some effect on the roughness/force of the waves, which is important for preservation of the dunes. But make no mistake, it's ultimately dunes that protect the oceanfront homes, not the beach itself unless you're really far back, as the Rodanthe houses once were.

Sometimes nourishment uses part of the sand to build up the front of the dunes. But the ocean doesn't have to go over the top of the dunes to cause damage. If it undercuts the dunes, it will take them out completely. To provide good protection, dunes need to be engineered.

The last go round on rebuilding the dunes in Kitty Hawk has been very successful because they're not just sand. The base of the dunes are bladders full of sand and rocks, so they don't get undercut.

If you notice the photos from Rodanthe, the houses that the ocean took were not protected by anything. In the photo you provide, the gaps in the dunes indicate overwash and under-cutting. Hard to say how much vegetation was growing on them. Not enough obviously.

NightOwl




I think you missed the qualifier I keyed after fix...."right now." If I thought it were to last forever, I would have not added "right now." Anyway....the "fix right now" or the patch is welcome right now. It may hold them over a bit.

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By: jfalba
6/22/2022 8:39 PM

I was going to ask..one bad hurricane or nor easter could wash it all away again? I remember when a storm took away the actual hook and tidal pool at Cape Point.and then Shelly Island disappeared too. That's a lot of money for sand the owner pays.

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By: Bentmtn
6/22/2022 9:00 PM

I was going to ask..one bad hurricane or nor easter could wash it all away again? I remember when a storm took away the actual hook and tidal pool at Cape Point.and then Shelly Island disappeared too. That's a lot of money for sand the owner pays.

jfalba


Yes...it could certainly happen with a noreaster this winter. We had some bad ones when we were here last year. One in January had 59 mph sustained winds for several hours and I was re thinking our purchase of soundfront! Just keeping fingers crossed for the oceanfront in all areas of the OBX. The ocean be the ocean! Man can only do but so much.

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By: NightOwl
6/22/2022 11:53 PM

one bad hurricane or nor easter could wash it all away again?

jfalba


That's a harder question to answer than you think, but well worth discussing.

The sand could migrate out to what is the first dune in the ocean. If that's what happens, it will migrate back in the summer, usually.

If it migrates down the beach, it's gone for that beach, but new sand might come in from up the beach. Or not, if the land juts out above your portion of the beach. Lateral currents for OBX are pretty much north to south.

The basics of this are pretty simple, but as you dig down deeper, not so much.

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By: GrandpaD
6/23/2022 6:54 PM

Looks like they have a runaway pontoon...



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By: jfalba
6/24/2022 6:52 AM

I was reading up about dredged sand on the beach. Apparently they put filters on so nothing much but sand gets through. A story about people finding reales and gold coins on a NJ beach. they think it was caused by the dredging being on top of an old shipwreck. interesting though. I do wonder about that little statue found in the dunes. How long he was sitting in there. The wood probably floated or a big hurricane. Man made dunes pushed it in with the sand.

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By: jfalba
6/24/2022 6:59 AM

Dont smack me around, but when was the last CAT 5 Hurricane direct hit on the banks? Guess that will test the bridge. I was there after SANDY skimmed the coast going North and the beaches were flat as a pancake and another time when SC got hit hard and the ocean was raging on our KDH vacation.

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By: GrandpaD
6/24/2022 6:09 PM

Dare County posted that Avon nourishment "will pause" June 27 and nourishment will begin in Buxton.

More info - Click to follow link...

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By: Bentmtn
6/24/2022 6:35 PM

A side feature of having your beach re nourished, is the large amount of shells that can be found after the sand pumping is done. The parents had a place on Cherry Grove Beach, SC for a few years and two different times we visited them after a couple of nourishments. The shells were plentiful and pretty.

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