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I've been following the weather and admit that I'm anxious about potential hits to the NC coast. We just purchased a house in Southport (closed last week!) and will be going down a couple of weekends a month until we move permanently in about 18-20 months.
The house is about 2 miles from Southport's riverfront and 5 miles from Oak Island. It's not in a flood plain so we don't have flood insurance. We did take out extra wind/hail protection. Could we still be at risk for flooding should we take a direct hit? I know the path of the storm is still an unknown and we should know more by the weekend.
Could we still be at risk for flooding should we take a direct hit? I know the path of the storm is still an unknown and we should know more by the weekend.
Nobody has any way of knowing that. My be is that you might have local flooding in a 100-year flood plane, but not in a 500-year flood plane. How close are you to streams or local low spots? How well is the lot graded? You might consider sand-bagging in front of the garage door.
Nobody has any way of knowing that. My be is that you might have local flooding in a 100-year flood plane, but not in a 500-year flood plane. How close are you to streams or local low spots? How well is the lot graded? You might consider sand-bagging in front of the garage door.
Thanks goldenage. We've been researching flood plains and it looks like we'll be ok unless a water surge reached 20 ft. There's no guarantee for anything so it looks like we just wait and pray Irma veers back out to sea.
You might also try to contact your new neighbors about local conditions. Streams, ponds and over-flowing drainage ditches are more likely sources of flooding than the ocean.
I don't want to play into the fear/hype of the media here, but take it from someone who was there for all that hit in the 90's (and there were several), the latest track from NOAA is showing the exact same track as those from the 90's now. Hug the east coast of Florida and comes up. They get caught up in the warm gulf stream but can't make the sharp turn around Myrtle and get slung right up the Cape Fear river. Bertha, Fran, Bonnie, Dennis, Floyd..and so on.
Need to pay attention to this one. NOAA is still showing it as a 3+ while on the coast of J'ville, FL with their latest trajectory. Fran in 96 was a 3, and it did some damage. Personally, 3 is my limit. Anything over that, and I'm out.
City will cut power as it comes on to prevent accidents. You won't have power for several days. Bugs will be displaced and they'll be p/o'd. Pull the boats, or at a minimum triple tie it up on a floating dock only. Pay attention to where you put your car in relation to those tall pines, because many will be coming down. If you've never been through one before in Wilm, you will be stunned at how far they'll bend, but they will snap in the middle on the winds, and uproot if long soaking prior too.
Back in my day, Buffalo's was our savior for supplies off of Wrightsville Avenue.
I've been following the weather and admit that I'm anxious about potential hits to the NC coast. We just purchased a house in Southport (closed last week!) and will be going down a couple of weekends a month until we move permanently in about 18-20 months.
The house is about 2 miles from Southport's riverfront and 5 miles from Oak Island. It's not in a flood plain so we don't have flood insurance. We did take out extra wind/hail protection. Could we still be at risk for flooding should we take a direct hit? I know the path of the storm is still an unknown and we should know more by the weekend.
I'm not in insurance, but I suspect you have water damage coverage (just not actual flood)?
A tree comes down through the roof and it rains into the home, the cause of the water damage is the hole in the roof. You're covered.
The area floods from the ground up into the home with no structural damage that helped to facilitate the water damage, you're not covered.
In a hurricane in this area with these tall and thin pine trees, 7/10 chance water damage is structurally caused by some 3rd party element (the tree).
Just ask those in that area what the area looked like during hurricane Floyd in 1999. If it didn't flood then, it certainly won't flood now. Considering you're not in a flood zone (meaning a 100 year map was likely checked to verify), then highly doubtful it flooded during Floyd.
Hurricane Floyd essentially wiped out the majority of eastern north Carolina in general. The city of Rocky Mount has never fully recovered economically from that storm. We had farm animal carcasses from up state floating through downtown Wilmington that had drowned and were being sent out to sea via the Cape Fear River. It was by all accounts a natural disaster. Probably still one of (if not the most) costly natural disasters to hit North Carolina in general.
Irma is nothing like Floyd. Irma is small, tight, and very fast. Floyd was huge, slow motion soaker for nearly 36 hours before landfall ever hit.
Also, I wouldn't worry about the build quality of the new home either. Ever since that run of hurricanes that hit the area from 95 to 99, building requirements have been strengthened to prevent and protect. We had homes moved off of their foundations during some of those Cat 2 storms, which was a huge cost for the insurance companies to cover. So, today, any residential home that has been built since that era, has needed to essentially be strapped down to the earth with cables and cords strong enough to hold the property still during a hurricane. Not sure of what scale, but certainly no less than the Cat 3 I would guess. I suspect Cat 4 is the threshold (can't really defend against a Cat 5 since it really has no ceiling measurement for max wind speed to test against for protection against the classification designation.) Can't really make a builder use something strong enough to prevent damage in a "put your head between your knees and kiss your tushy goodbye" situation!
Looks like Irma will be going more inland away from NC coast line. Although I've seen them change in all my years in NC . Plus being 100 miles from the coast we've had our rv share of damage .
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