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Irene: Canoeing The Streets of Oriental
A Tour of The Flooded Village
August 28, 2011

I
rene’s storm surge on Saturday morning is estimated to have been 9-1/2 feet in Oriental, roughly 4 inches higher than in 2003’s Hurricane Isabel. Water in some downtown streets was chest high. The peak of the waters came between 8 and 9a followed by the calm eye of Irene.

It was a long eye, as eyes go. At 10:30a, a TownDock crew took to the streets in a canoe to survey the landscape, much of which was under water.

Hodges Street in front of the Village Gallery where a cooler appeared to have come to rest on one of the sculptures out in front. The building with the white boards over windows is The Bean which took on water during the height of the surge.

Paddling by familiar landmarks was a tour in to the surreal. You marvel at the remade vista, all that water where air usually is, and at the same time, you know that for the buildings and people who live in them, there are months of work ahead.

Oriental Harbor and pilings that are normally far above the water.

We paddled as far as the watery route would allow, a path that went from South Water to Hodges, to First, to Freemason, Church Broad and Hodges and back to South Water and a towel. The eye was closing as the journey went on, and by 11:30, the winds — that were hastening the drainage in town, were also making the paddling more strenuous.

Here are some more photos of the journey.

One thing to note: these water levels were photographed about an hour and a half after the peak of the storm surge. Things were flooded even more than shown here.

The Inland Waterway Provision Company at Hodges and South Water.
The Garland Fulcher Seafood Market.
A truck was parked on First Street near the intersection of Neuse Street. That’s the Cartwright House in the background.
An oak in front of the pink-roofed house on Freemason was down Saturday morning. One nearby power pole was pushed over as well, and wires and cables hung in the waters. At 11a, Freemason was still traversable by canoe.
The Methodist Church Parking lot has traditionally been a place to park cars in hurricanes because it’s on higher ground. It appears that worked again. This photo was taken around 11a when the waters had receded about a foot.
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Broad Street from in front of Town Hall and the Old Theater, looking toward the Oriental Bridge.
In 2003 when Hurricane Isabel hit Oriental with its storm surge, it was remarked that the waters had reached the intersection of Broad and Church where Oriental’s Town Hall sits. Hurricane Irene brought water there too, and then some. The roof of Town Hall appeared to have been damaged as well (lower left).
Some color in the otherwise overcast and greytoned landscape, the mural on the Old Theater reflected in the waters that flooded Broad Street.
Broad Street was flooded from Town Hall, at Church Street to the base of the Oriental Bridge. Vehicles couldn’t get thru, but those on bike and boat did.
Reuben Maxwell and Ben Cox motored a dinghy around town as well. Here, they pause at the intersection of Broad and Hodges to listen and watch…. at a safe distance….
… a propane tank that had sprung a leak in Norma Smith’s yard. (We didn’t venture any closer either, but can report that a blue-tinged spume flew a few feet from the tank.).
The Steamer restaurant at Broad and Hodges took on water.

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The intersection of Broad and Hodges and the Old Central Hotel.
If you’re looking for the corner of Hodges and Broad look for this porch at the Old Hotel. It’ll be the landmark until the street sign, which flew on to the porch, is repaired.
Hodges Street Sail Repair and the Quonset hut next to it were flooded. Gil Fontes says he was glad he and Laura Turgeon remained in the repair shop that is their home because with the water levels rising even higher than expected, they were able to keep carrying their things to the second floor..
What the fashion-conscious storm surge survivor wears….
The way to travel during the eye of a hurricane. Bernie Harberts propels the TownDock canoe through Oriental.
On Hodges, a row of old lumber company homes appeared to have taken on water.
Elizabeth Cordes’ Oriental Dental.

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At the corner of New and South Water Streets, M&M’s took on water and in the foreground, some of Gary Gresko’s “Waveform” sculptures went down, despite having been tethered in to place pre-storm. The sculptor works with recycled materials; these were made of one-time dock planks.
At Hodges and South Water on the way back. An hour in to the canoe ride, the top of the red stairs leading to the Inland Waterway Provision Company are emerging from the water.
Mike Vardy emerges from his house on South Water. One of the original “Pickles Row” houses, it had water in it at the peak of the storm.
On South Water Street, a boat gets within a few feet of being launched.
Back to where the canoe trip began. TownDock HQ’s had a tree fall across the front yard. The post in the center of the photo holds the TownDock Weather Station. Note the difference in the water levels between this photo, and …
…this one, taken about an hour earlier when water levels were higher and Jack dog paddled after the canoe. The waters were to recede as the winds clocked around to the south and pulled the water at the end of Pamlico Sound toward the ocean.

If you were to walk the same route this week, you might look around and decide that it didn’t look like much hurricane damage was done. That’s because much of the coverage that hurricanes gets is devoted to describing how fast the winds went and what structures took a direct hit from them.

But in Oriental, it’s not the wind as much as the water that does the most direct damage during hurricanes. Just a fraction of an inch of water on a home’s floor, or below the floor in the duct work, can mean a long process of repair. Even though Irene’s waters were not around for long, they left a mark in many homes and businesses, which this canoe tour may help explain.

Posted Sunday August 28, 2011 by Melinda Penkava


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