Officials looking for federal disaster aid at Shore

WILDWOOD - Federal and state officials will tour New Jersey coastal counties today, assessing the aftermath of last weekend's sweeping rain, wind, and flood tides - and the need for disaster aid.

The storm caused millions of dollars in damage to public and private property from Sea Bright to Cape May, local officials estimated yesterday, as cleanup continued.

"Whenever you go a long time without a storm like this one, people's memories fade about just how bad it can get," Wildwood City Commissioner Bill Davenport said. "And this one was certainly up there with the worst storms."

In Ocean City alone, the damage to private and public property could exceed $90 million, city officials said last night. Frank Donato, emergency management coordinator for Ocean City, said the city's huge losses were due to about 7 million cubic yards of sand washing out to sea.

In Long Beach Island, estimates put the damage at upward of $30 million, local officials said last night.

Frank McCall, Cape May County's emergency management coordinator, said Sea Isle City is estimating losses of $15 million in erosion and damage to public property; Avalon, about $4 million; and Strathmere, nearly $3 million in damages. McCall said those numbers could increase.

Atlantic County emergency management officials estimated losses there as $16 million.

On Sunday, Gov. Corzine declared a state of emergency in Atlantic, Burlington, Cape May, Cumberland, Ocean, and Monmouth Counties. Local officials hope today's visit, which includes officials from the Army Corps of Engineers and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, leads to federal disaster aid.

While towns all along the coast sustained damage, Atlantic City and Wildwood appear to have born the brunt of the nor'easter, stirred up from the remnants of Hurricane Ida.

Although Wildwood has wide beaches, the highest point on the island is about eight feet, making it a prime target for flooding, especially along its back bays.

In Atlantic City, where preliminary estimates put damage to beaches and the Boardwalk at $10 million, wind was a big issue. The sustained blow and strong gusts pushed high waves onto the beachfront and under the Boardwalk. When the storm-swelled tides pulled back out to sea, the Boardwalk's planks went along.

Along the Shore, the worst damage occurred at the northern ends of the barrier islands, the result of the extraordinary northeast winds that conjured beach-devouring waves.

Beginning at 3 a.m. Wednesday, a buoy off Cape May detected howling winds out of the northeast that continued for 85 hours - until 4 p.m. Saturday.

The same buoy measured gale-force winds - 39 m.p.h. or better - for 15 straight hours on Thursday followed by more on Friday, said James Eberwine, the marine specialist at the National Weather Service in Mount Holly.

By contrast, from October 2007 to May 2009, the same buoy recorded gale force winds for a total of 30 hours, according to the weather service. Winds blew directly in the faces of Atlantic City's Inlet section, the Gardens section of Ocean City, and the Avalon Inlet area.

All that wind, combined with flood tides, left sand where it shouldn't be - on roadways instead of beaches - and broke wooden beach stairs, boardwalk planks, and sand fences like toothpicks.

That left municipalities yesterday trying to secure the remnants.

During an unseasonably warm afternoon, workers such as Darryl Smith in North Wildwood found themselves wiping sweat from their brows and marveling about what nature had wrought. Smith was among a crew of workers removing seaweed, sand, and trash that had accumulated along Ocean Avenue after floodwaters subsided.

Across the street, where last week there were dunes as tall as two-story houses and a wide expanse of beachfront, yesterday there was nothing but waves lapping against a bulkhead. Wooden stairs that had once led onto the beach hung above a 10-foot drop.

"I never thought I'd see the likes of this," said Smith, 27, a lifelong Cape May County resident. "Wildwood's supposed to have the widest beaches of anywhere. Now, in places, there's almost nothing left."

That was how the beach looked up in Beach Haven, too, where local officials noted just how close the surf was now coming to oceanfront homes, according to Bev Kochik, the town's deputy emergency management coordinator.

"People are worried about what's going to happen to their homes the next time we get a nor'easter," Kochik said.

The nor'easter season is certainly off to a roaring start - a disconcerting thought, considering the typical peak season is still several weeks away, said Ken Reeves, director of forecast operations for AccuWeather Inc. A Mother's Day storm in May and an October nor'easter already had torn a considerable amount of sand from the Shore's beaches before this one hit, he said.

"This is a time of the year when we don't really have them," Reeves said. "Wait until a time when we do really have them."

The nor'easter season tends to peak in winter when cold polar air migrates southeast and interacts with the Gulf Stream and the relatively warm Atlantic waters.

In the early going, this season is disturbingly reminiscent of the winter of 1997-98, said Stewart Farrell, head of the Coastal Research Center at Stockton State College. That's when a sequence of storms culminated with a strong nor'easter in February that led to the last federal disaster declaration at the Jersey Shore.

That winter coincided with a strong El Niño, an unusual warming of waters in the tropical Pacific that affects weather patterns in North America and sometimes leads to frequent Atlantic coastal storms. Another El Niño has developed this year, and it may become a strong one, according to the government's Climate Prediction Center.

But others are more concerned about the effects they can see right now.

"We will get more storms, and the key is that we have to keep being prepared for them," said Kevin Hall, a spokesman for Atlantic City. "Those who propose that we lower the dunes here to create a better view might be rethinking their stance after they see what this storm did. Beach erosion is a problem here, just like it is everywhere else at the Shore."

Beach fill projects have long been a source of contention, with critics insisting that they are an expensive and Sisyphean effort. But some experts, including Farrell, contend that the damages might have been far worse this time around in places such as Strathmere and Surf City, which had recently completed projects.

Erosion was far more severe in Harvey Cedars, which is awaiting a fill, compared with Surf City, which had one two years ago, Farrell said.

And Farrell is among those who fear more severe storms this season.

"It could happen four, five, seven, eight, 10 times more," he said.