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urried preparations for a hurricane visit were what many people were focused on Wednesday & Thursday. The Hurricane Joaquin forecast then looked potentially dire for Oriental. The governor issued a State of Emergency on Thursday for all of North Carolina’s 100 counties. Cape Lookout National Park was evacuated and closed. A mandatory evacuation order was also issued for Ocracoke, as ferries on route to the island would transport only island residents. The North Carolina Seafood Festival moved its headline concert to an indoor arena, the Crystal coast Civic Center.

On Friday, with a forecast track keeping Hurricane Joaquin offshore, life is calmer. But TownDock.net was about town earlier this week to take in the preparations.

Pat Stockwell and Nancy Crawford at the Inland Waterway Provision Company on Hodges Street in Oriental reported a brisk sale for long lengths of dock line, fenders and odds and ends hardware. Pat also observed, “We have had a run on Pamlico Reeboks also. We only have two pairs left.” Locals have affectionately adopted that name for the short-top white boots worn by fishermen who work on trawlers and in the fish houses.

The Provision Company boot supply earlier in the week – before it got thinned out.

Greg Ruzicka at Village Hardware said, “People are afraid they are going to lose power. We have been selling a much larger number of flashlights, batteries, and propane.”

At Deaton’s Yacht Service Thursday boats were getting pulled to avoid the dangers of tangling with a hurricane.

Across the creek at Sailcraft Service the same – pulling boats and getting them safely on high land.

A sailboat at Sailcraft asks a good question.

Because the forecast indicated on Thursday that it would be Sunday before Joaquin could make landfall near the Carolina coast, local fisherman Keith Bruno, with Hurricane Irene’s call on his neighborhood clinging to his memory, was taking action. He described perhaps the best philosophy to have about preparing for a storm: “We are going all out to move everything that should be moved, but no matter how hard we have to work to do this, we will be happy if it turns out we didn’t have to do it.”

While some people moved their possessions to higher land, Keith Bruno was moving boats to what would hopefully be lower water, to the headwaters of Green Creek. On Thursday afternoon, Keith’s son, Zachary, enlisted his father’s help to move his sailboat to Greens Creek.

Zachary, who just recently graduated from high school and is planning for a career on commercial ocean-going vessels, took his position at the helm of his sailboat to man the rudder for the tow.

Hurricane Irene in 2011 did significant damage to the Bruno family’s seafood business, Endurance Seafood, destroying the building they used to freeze fresh seafood and make ice for the day’s catch.

As early as Wednesday, crabbers were pulling their pots from the Neuse River. For them, pulling the pots is a better business move than taking the risk of losing them.

Capt. Ron Dimond and his employee, Johny Armstrong, prepared to secure his recently acquired barge and crane by filing it with ballast water so it will sink in the marsh behind his home on Oriental road just west of the Robert Scott Bridge. They will pump water into the barge simply to pump it out and re-float the barge after the threat of Joaquin has passed. Dimon stated “I am going to sink this barge right here, I couldn’t stand for it to get loose and destroy millions of dollars worth of boats in Oriental harbors.”

Dimond is a Merchant Marine captain who operated a dredging, pile-driving, dock, and sea wall construction company in Pompano Beach, FL before moving to Oriental. The ground floor of his home was completely destroyed in Hurricane Irene, doing enough damage to the upper floor that he and his family camped out in their Pickers’ Barn of Highway 55 west of Oriental while the upstairs was remodeled.

Dimond says he fought recent rain and high winds when his tug was parked in the slip adjacent to the barge. While moving it, “I kept feeling something bite my legs almost to my waist. The water was two feet over the dock.” A jellyfish? “No,” he responded, “but I found out that fire ants can bite you when you are in the water.”

Ron Dimond

Jerry Fitzgerald, veteran of the first Gulf War, was once known for his nimble fingers at the controls of a Harrier. Now feeling stress from an approaching hurricane, Fitzgerald put his hands to work at the helm of Sayuri, (si-you-ree, in Japanese, さゆり, tender ways to describe a Japanese young lady). Sayuri was the name given to Jerry’s daughter when she was born in Japan.

Jerry & Becky Fitzgerald moved Sayuri, to a slip in Pecan Grove Marina. Pecan Grove Marina is known for being well protected during storms.

On Friday, a forecast that kept Hurricane Joaquin offshore brought most preparations to a halt.

Posted Friday October 2, 2015 by Keith N. Smith