As I write this (2 September 1999), tropical storm Dennis is still plaguing the Outer Banks. Several days ago, I went down to Duck to batten down the hatches; it was quite an experience.
Sitting in a beachfront house even in a storm with only 50 MPH/65 MPH gusts is pretty scary, as the higher parts of the house tend to wobble a bit after hours and days of assault from the wind.
When I entered the house at 5:30 AM, it sounded like a party was going on. As it turns out, it was the wind partying on a casement window with a broken latch. It was slowly pulling the window open. Of course, I didn't figure out what the problem was for a while, and having the wind working against me every time I opened the window to examine things delayed the process. Eventually I figured out that a latch wasn't working and was also keeping the window from closing completely. The best answer seemed to be to force the latch open so the window could close. But how to secure it? Clearly with some wood and nails -- but I had no wood, leading to the following solution.
Yes, that's a cutting board. But it wasn't a very expensive one. In any case, it held, the window was still there yesterday.
As the winds rose steadily, I heard a loud sound and turned around to see a
piece of aluminum fly off the house. Soon thereafter, the wind started
peeling the shingles off a corner of the house. I had no idea what to do
about it, so I nailed a rope to the deck, ran it around the roof corner, and
nailed the other side. Again, it seemed to work -- I lost no more shingles
after that.
Okay, so I'm not Bob Vila, but the furshlugginer house is still there, y'know? In this shot, you see all three problem points -- the cutting board and window, the missing shingles, and the place where the aluminum flew away, just above the cutting board (actually you can even see the aluminum in the lower left hand corner of the picture).
Another damage shot.
Belowdecks, the other problem child was the hot tub cover. No matter how strapped down it was, the eventual 50 MPH winds with 60+ MPH gusts kept threatening to make the cover a flying carpet. Again I resorted to nails and rope:
It did the trick, but no nails could keep the dune in place. A view along the beach illustrates this:
Just to give you some perspective, there used to be DUNE underneath the horizontal part of the walkway, and the stairs sloped down at the same angle as the dune.
And it's not done yet...
Hmmm... I seem to recall that there was sand at the bottom of this before...
That persistent northeast wind has an interesting effect on the sound, as well:
The sound doesn't really have tides, but the wind can blow it all away.
If things continue and the house is on Minasi Island, I'll try to get aerial pictures of the new geology. Can I declare myself a sovereign nation then?