An unoccupied home washed away over the weekend into the surf along the Outer Banks.
It happened Friday in Rodanthe as the North Carolina coast was still dealing with swells and rough surf from Hurricane Ernesto.
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Friday’s incident marks the seventh North Carolina home to fall victim to rising surf in the last four years. All seven homes that washed into the water happened in Rodanthe.
“It’s scary and it’s kind of depressing too,” said Rodanthe resident Gus Gusler, who lives about 100 yards from the home that washed away.
Gusler says the debris from the home caused him to cancel the next two weeks of renters at his house up the beach. He said every time this happens it creates a bigger sense of urgency in the community that it’s time to move these homes further from the shore.
“It’s outrageously expensive, and you have no help,” Gusler said. “You’re on your own."
Gusler said a couple of his neighbors have spent $350,000 to move their home. He said about 12 homes in his neighborhood need moving.
According to Gusler, moving the homes is worth the price to protect their barrier island oasis.
Gusler and others are hopeful their stretch of beach will go through a renourishment process, but Dare County planning director Noah Gillam said that’s unlikely.
“We’ve been pursuing funding, but we haven’t been able to find it yet,” Gillam said.
Because of the county’s plan, Gusler said he plans to move his home away from the water about 136 feet. He hopes to do that after Jan. 1, 2025, so he doesn’t have to continue to deal with scenes like this. He said a storm earlier this year washed so much sand up under his home, it buried and totaled his car.
“I wonder if, at some point in time, that whole island is going to wash away,” Gusler said. “I hope not because the history there is just unbelievable with Black Beard and everything else.”
How much would a Rodanthe beach nourishment project cost?
Rodanthe has an erosion rate greater than 15 feet per year, according to a May 2023 study presented to Dare County leaders.
A beach renourishment program is a potential solution, but it means crews would need to add sediment to erosion areas again and again. It also costs money to do this kind of program.
“I think it’s interesting to look at what a beach nourishment project would cost in Rodanthe, which is on the order of about $30 million," said East Carolina University Integrated Coastal Programs' Executive Director Dr. Reide Corbett. "If you were to take that $30 million and buy the homes out that are the most vulnerable, each nourishment project is likely to last between four and six years for $30 million.
"But if you take that money and buy out the vulnerable houses, you would buy yourself about 20 years of space to allow that erosion to take space.”
Dare County leaders said they can't afford it.
"So far, we just haven't met any of the qualifying characteristics of the applications when applying," Gillam said.
WRAL News asked Gillam why homes collapsing into the Atlantic Ocean doesn't qualify.
“The area where it’s occurring, typically you’ve got to have a larger tax base," Gillam said. "Something that’s going to keep providing funding for nourishment projects and the Rodanthe area doesn’t have a large enough tax base.”