National Park Service digging out from Hurricane Irene damage
Besides ringing up a $10 billion price tag for cleanups from North Carolina to New York, Hurricane Irene has become the gift that keeps on giving.
One of North Carolina anglers’ favorite fall surf-fishing destinations — Portsmouth Island, aka North Core Banks — has been rendered off-limits, probably until 2012, by the storm’s effects.
Irene chopped 25 feet off the island’s eastern coast line from its northern to southern ends, left a handful of rental cabins near Long Point Ferry Landing uninhabitable, covered the old Long Point landing with tons of sand, fouled freshwater wells, disabled septic tanks servicing the rental cabins and overwashed the Back Sound Road in many places.
This damage will keep surf anglers and their vehicles from being ferried over this fall, and they likely won’t be able to return until the spring of 2012, if then.
Because the area is part of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore, the federal government is involved in repairing the damage, and the government is strapped for money and funds haven’t been earmarked for the needed repair work.
However, few people understand that the National Park Service is between a rock and a hard place when it comes to opening up the area.
Wouter Ketel, a management assistant for the NPS at Core Banks and Shackleford Banks, said the NPS has received a lot of complaints from people upset that there’s no access to Portsmouth Island.
“We’re working as fast as we can to get started (on repairs),” Ketel said, admitting that the major problem is that so many areas need help that it’s difficult to get started.
Ketel said the the NPS’ No. 1 goal is to repair or replace the Long Point Landing so visitors can return.
“Our main priority is getting the docking area built so we can begin to land visitors, including anglers, on the island as soon as possible,” he said. “It’s just that (repairs) are a drawn-out process. But getting (services) re-established also is a very important priority.
“It’s not on the back burner by any stretch of the imagination.”
Long Point is the lone ferry-landing access at North Core Banks. The Willis Ferry Service at Davis transporting autos and visitors across Core Sound to South Core Banks remains in operation, so fishing and camping continue at that island to the south.
Many other problems must be corrected before anglers and visitors can return to Portsmouth Island. Even if the ferry landing is repaired, cabins must have shingles replaced, and water and sewer must be repaired and be in operating condition.
“We had a (local) guy with a bulldozer already under contract for other work, but his contract has been moved up a month so he can start working now (on well, sewer and road) repair,” said Ketel, who said the NPS has pulled emergency funds from other projects to fund repair Irene damages at Portsmouth Island.
“Unlike when (Hurricane) Isabel hit and the Park Service had plenty of emergency funds, we didn’t have any reserves this time,” he said. “We’re just prioritizing things, shuffling funds around, but that’s probably going to come to an end because the emergency funds will run out or some other projects will have to be started.”
At the same time, even though he works for the federal government, Ketel is trying to find his way through a maze of environmental demands required by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and North Carolina’s Coastal Area Management Authority.
“Realistically, we might get (Portsmouth Island) open next spring, but it probably would be at the end of the (spring) fishing season and not soon enough to do any good,” Ketel said.
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