Some Hurricane Alex pictures here.
Some Hurricane Alex pictures here. One of the best doesn’t appear there, though.
Meanwhile, it looks like Ocracoke may have taken a harder hit than it did from Isabel, as far as flooding goes.
Alex returned to almost the same spot but did not deliver a full force blow to the Outer Banks, a fragile chain of islands that is known for its miles of undeveloped beaches where the population swells with thousands of tourists in summer.
But at least 100 cars were flooded in Ocracoke village by the surging water, Hyde County manager Don Davenport told Reuters in a telephone interview from his office in Swan Quarter on the North Carolina mainland.
Many belonged to tourists stranded on the low-lying island, which has a summertime population of about 4,500 and is accessible only by boat or plane.
“We also have a number of homes that received flood water,” Davenport said of Ocracoke village, which was worst hit along with the southern end of Hatteras Island.
Electricity was out on all of Ocracoke Island and portions of Hatteras Island. Officials in Dare County said that on Hatteras Island some 3,000 customers were without power by mid-afternoon. Power had been restored to 4,000 users there.
The storm left Ocracoke Island’s only highway covered with water and sand in numerous places, Davenport said. The road, N.C. 12, leads to a ferry at the north end of the island.
Massive sand dunes near the road, which were reconstructed after Hurricane Isabel, also were destroyed, Davenport said.
Update: Alger Willis looks to have made it through.