04/23/08

Riding Out Hurricane Isabel

(September 2003)

by Ed Boyle

I spotted the hurricane on the satellite picture on September 12, and since it was so large and organized, began plotting its progress. When it came to the attention of the media, some days later, it looked as if it would miss Florida, and I began to breathe easier. Little did I know?
By the 16th, it was clear that we were going to get it in Maryland, and that it would be going up the west side of the Chesapeake, close enough to be a problem. My grandson Gary and I went down to Seneca Creek and pulled the runabout out of the water, took it to the highest ground at the top of the driveway, and put on a nice new cover. As we left, we said it would be fine unless a tree fell on it. Another portent.

On Thursday, Isabel was downgraded to a tropical storm, but a strong one, and large enough so that the influence of its winds would be felt for a long time. My pier at the Creek is protected from all directions but the east and southeast, which makes it susceptible to hurricane winds and swells. The Sea Trek is moored exactly north/south, so that all the strong winds and swells would be on the beam, which is not a tenable position. I therefore took along lunch, dinner and breakfast, and took the boat up the Creek to a more protected location. The only trouble with the location was that it was still open to the east, and southeast, but there were no boats likely to come loose and bang into it, and I had four anchors (15, 20, 35 plows and a 25 pound Danforth). No chain on the big ones, but with the storm dying, I figured that it would be OK.

All afternoon I sat around at anchor, watching the trees sway, but with little wind over the deck, and no problem. There was a little rain from 6 PM or so, but no more than 2 inches, and it stopped by 1 AM. By 9 at night, all was well, but when I sacked out at about l0, the wind began to pick up. It was still northeast, and I was pretty well protected. I napped a bit, but around 12:30 AM the wind began to howl, and it was blowing from the east. The biggest waves were about a foot high, but the tide had come in a couple of feet. When I looked around me, the scene looked different, and I finally realized that the anchors had dragged, and from time to time were continuing to do so. I had anchored about 800 feet from the end of the creek, and that distance had shrunken to 400 or so. For the next hour, I tried to power against the wind, which I could do, but with the anchors still on the bottom, I could not go far before the boat would be stopped, and the bow would swing downwind. The boat would then zoom toward the shore, which had houses, trees, seawalls, and other hazards to navigation, and I would desperately try to get it headed upwind again. Despite my increasingly frantic efforts, the boat repeated this maneuver, coming to rest, aground in someone's front lawn, pointed downwind, and hung up on the rudders. The water aft of the boat was too deep for me to wade very far and put out an anchor, and besides, it would not have held much, and they were still somewhat restraining forward motion. I could not free the rudders, as they were dug in pretty well, and I could not turn the boat. It was too much aground, and the wind was far too strong. During the efforts, I bumped my left shin, which has since swelled up and turned several beautiful colors. The wind was gusting to at least 50 and probably 60 knots, but I was stuck, there was no grinding, and the boat was immobile. Off the stbd bow, about 50 feet away was a house with water almost up to the windows, and there was a strange flashing white light coming from behind it. I was very discouraged with my situation, and puzzled about the light.

After 20 minutes or so, the tide had come in another increment, and the boat slid off and headed for the back yard, where there was a line of trees off to port. I steered for them, and managed to get a line onto one of them. There was 6 feet of water under the keels, and as long as the trees held and the line did not break, I was safe for a while. The trees were mostly gum trees, and the seed balls, which are about 1.4 inches in diameter kept being blown off the trees and hitting the boat with good thumps. Leaves were also coming down in profusion, but they caused no problem.

I pulled up the anchors, which had accumulated huge balls of grass, plastic sheeting, mud and etc., which was the reason they would not hold. I also discovered the cause of the flashing light. There was a car with its headlights on parked behind the house. As the trough of each waves came along, the headlights could shine, but at the crest they were totally under water. In a half hour the flashing stopped as the water rose, and about an hour later the lights went out completely. The pickup truck parked right behind it had its lights a little higher, and an alarm system, which was bleating its alarm for hours. Lights on the truck, and its alarm lasted until about 5 AM. By 6:15, it was light enough to see that only the roofs of the two cars were still out of water, and the water was up to the windshield of the pickup. The water was well into the house. These items made very convenient depth gauges, since I knew that the water was a foot deeper than upon my (unplanned) arrival. I did not know how soon the water would recede, but with the wind down to 25 or 30 knots, it would begin to flow out pretty soon so I had to get moving - upwind.

Getting under way was very tricky. The wind was at about 1 o'clock position and about 25 knots, and the boat was unable to go directly forward, since the branches of the trees held the mast and rigging. I had to move it sideways about 12 feet before I could move forward. I tried, but the wind caught the bow as I released the stern line, and I either had to hit the house or back into the trees, so I was in about the same spot as I had been, but pointed in the wrong direction. I decided that the only thing I could do was to try to back out of the problem, though if the rudders hit anything solid while moving backwards, they would probably snap off. It took about 2/3 power to back into the wind, and I kept going as slowly as I could and still keep steerage way.

Pretty soon I was at the creek bank, and I continued to back for another 500 yards, turned around, and headed for home. I made a pass by my pier, but it was totally under water. I could tell that I was looking in the right place, since the neighbor's boat lift guide poles were still visible, though the motor/gear units were in the murky depths. I anchored on the other side of the creek, which was sheltered from the wind, and had breakfast. (A beer and the remainder of my pie dessert, followed by bacon and eggs).

After drying out the stbd bilge, which caught some topside leaks, I figured that sitting there was no fun, so I launched the dinghy and headed for my place. Rowing straight downwind in 20 knots was easy, and I crossed the neighbor's (Kalb's) seawall and headed up his lawn. His house sits lower than mine, so he had about 31/2 feet of water in it, and his deck had floated away until it fetched up on my trees. I dinghyed between the trees at the adjacent side of my lot, and took a good? look at my place. The water was five feet deep in the yard, which made it 3 feet deep in the bathhouse, a foot or so in the house, five feet in the garage, and equally much in the outhouse. There was flotsam and diesel oil everywhere. The swells from the Bay were coming in about a foot high , so that there was considerable force still on anything which faced south.

Among the various items of flotsam was an old Kawasaki Model 550 jet ski, which is still there.
I could not get to the runabout because there was a downed 90-foot oak tree blocking the way. Nothing short of an M1 Abrams could have got to it. I went over to the other neighbor's place, and rowed up to the street. There were 5 cars and trucks with at least 3 feet of water surrounding them, all within 50 feet of my driveway. One of them had cushioned the fall of my big tree with its windshield. Only a small set of cracks, but I imagine that its nice northstar engine is now a southstar, or something. A car and a truck had cleverly gone up the road a little further, and were above the water. The 12 inch black walnut tree which fell on them did a noticeable amount of smashing.

I rowed in front of my gate, which was partly visible through the fallen tree limbs, but the
runabout, just a few feet inside the gate, was still not visible. Not a good sign There was only about 20 inches of water at the gate, but there had been about a foot more earlier on. All the boats people had parked at the marina down the street, on trailers, or blocks, were grinding together at the marina fence. The wind and swells had pushed them into a nice compact mass, with bows hitting windshields, and so on. Probably no really serious damage, but plenty of superficial damage. The continue banging and grinding made a neat noise, and nobody was doing anything about it. The power line from the pole to my house was intact, but no juice at the pole. I rowed down Beach road, over the top of mailboxes, and out into the creek again. It was a tough pull back to the boat, but good exercise.

I decided to go home, and arranged for Bill Buebel to meet me on Seneca Park Rd., since the traffic was stopped at several places by 11/2 feet of water. I secured the boat, locked it up, hugged it and went by dinghy back to my front gate. I tied the dinghy to the gate, walked and sloshed a while, and finally met up with Bill. Eastern Boulevard was closed at one place, and the traffic was being turned back, but Bill told them about his wounded friend who needed to see a doctor (not true, but useful), and got through all right.

The power was not on at 1418 Woodcliff. It had failed at about 6 PM on Thursday, and since there were some 600,000 customers without power, no great chance of getting it on. Aside from a few hundred leaves on the lawn, there was no damage at all.

On Saturday morning, Alice and her three boys beat me to the Creek. They cut and hauled pieces of tree, removed all the sodden rugs and linoleum from the house, and did yeoman service. We were able to get close enough to the runabout to determine that the fiberglass was split in a couple of places, and that the tree had hit the top of the engine. We have since got closer, and find that it drove the engine, an 88 hp Evinrude, into the ground, and when the foot of the engine stopped going down, the rest of the engine did not. I believe that the engine is now a foot shorter than it was on Thursday. I have to remove an 18 inch diameter piece of tree before I will be able to tell for sure. I may be able to salvage the spark plugs, but I doubt that much else is not bent or crushed. I do not think that my 6-ton jack will budge the tree at all. So there will be lots more chain sawing before I really know. The trailer is bent, also.
On Saturday afternoon, I returned to the Sea Trek and brought it back to the pier. We (Alice and boys went along) then took a ride up the Creek to see where I had spent Thursday night. The little cut into which I had stumbled was a wonderful place to tie up during a hurricane, but there was only 18 inches of water plus a quarter acre of flotsam there on Saturday. Back at my pier, the mooring piles had magically reappeared, and the Sea Trek is all nice and snug in its usual place. 99.99% unscathed. I used up a whole week's luck, which is probably why the trees made such a perfect impact on the engine.

On Sunday, Alice, Erich and the three boys plus Cynthia worked about 5 hours. We moved a lot of tree, but there is some 40 tons or more yet to go. Fortunately, a neighbor is willing to cut and haul much of it for firewood, so he was a major help, and will no doubt return for more. Today (Monday) Gladys and I worked for about 5 hours, and the county began to take away the branches and trash.

We were able to borrow a generator from Gladys' son David on Saturday evening, so we were able to power the refrigerator and a few lights. Baltimore Gas and Electric was so snowed that they refused to estimate when power would be restored. It finally came on at 10 PM on Sunday night. A welcome service indeed. Many people are looking forward to another 4 or five days without power.

I think that it will take about 100 man-hours to clean up the mess, if I can persuade some sawmill to take the tree trunks. They should each provide some 3600 board feet of nice, mostly clear oak lumber. It is black oak, rather than white, but should still be worthwhile. Sorting out the jumble in the garage and the lesser mess in the bathhouse will take more time. I do not know just how we will redo the house, but it has needed some refurbishing, so perhaps it is not all loss.

This flood was not quite as bad as 1933, but bad enough. I expect that property values will take some time to recover. If you see a runabout and engine, say 18 feet and 90 hp or so, please let me know. I am in the market for one.