Isabel slices Hatteras, cuts swaths of despair

News and Observer ^ | 9/20/03 | ISTIN COLLINS AND VICKI HYMAN,

[Rebelbase]

The story continues at the link, but ventures off into other subjects. There is a flyover video located at WRAL.COM that shows Hatteras Damage.

[Rebelbase]

NC ping please. This isn't good.

[Howlin]

Not good at all.

[blam]

That picture looks like the west end of Dauphin Island everytime we have a hurricane.

[gitmo]

Not good at all.

Yes, but that IS the nature of the outer banks. They are sand barriers that take the brunt of the force of Atlantic storms.

[BJungNan]

Not familiar with the area. The pic looks like the sand spit used to go all the way across without a break. Was there a road there before?

[alancarp]

Was there a road there before? Yes - NC State Road 12, which is the main (only) outer banks link from north to south.

[Rebelbase]

You can see the linear trend of where the road used to be by following the telephone poles out toward the inlet.

[alancarp]

No, it's not good: it's the worst I've seen in terms of coastal damage (Andrew was unbelieveable in proprty damage; this one got property mostly by washing the foundation out from under it).

It's also pretty evident from the photos that the sea washed over the entire barrier island for miles. That's the combination of (a) the "normal" storm surge conbined with (b) the direction this storm arrived from, (c) the hours of time to "pile up" the tidal surge, and (d) the fact that high tide was co-incident with the worst of the storm. It's exactly what I was worried about -- and probably worse since I was afraid of a bigger storm.

And this was "only" a Category TWO hurricane. Mercifully.

[southernnorthcarolina]

You can spot the location of the new inlet rather precisely here. It's at the narrow place between Hatteras village and Frisco. Zoom out to get a better perspective of the location. Note that Hatteras village is actually wellwest of Cape Hatteras itself -- 10 miles or so. The island at the point of the breach runs about WSW-to-ENE; at the Cape, it turns almost to a North and South alignment.

[Howlin]

[George from New England]

Even though you can't see it, I believe there was a road traversing the images - all gone. Telephone poles suggest such.

[Howlin]

Buxton:

[Howlin]

Hatteras Village:

The lighthouse:

[Howlin]

North to south view:

[Howlin]

Many more pictures here:

http://search.news.yahoo.com/search/news/?c=news_photos&p=hatteras

[Rebelbase]

Nice perspective on channel depth

[Rebelbase]

Another perspective looking south. Hatteras Village in the background

[TomB]

Here is a link to Microsoft's Terraserver overhead images of the area. You can zoom in and out to get an idea of where you are. NOTE: These are old images, they do NOT show storm damage.

Hatteras Island