Page 4 - Spilings News Today

>> when i first drove into town -- >> go ahead. >> im sorry. when i first drove into town, i had been relieved because i had already seen the pictures of the house and the fact that the house stood. i had already seen the pictures of destruction, but there was nothing like it firsthand. before i made it to the house, i already had fears for the community. >> it is so hard to look at the community now and think of everything that was lost. why did your house -- >> we were with our friends yesterd...

We are at a point now where we started running on hope of finding survivors. still people want to provide answers as far as what or who made it through the storm. i country the other activity and give a couple of residents, mike and eric jackson. they are underneath where the house used to be. they are standing amongst the pilings here, the stilts they used to hold up the house. it is now entirely gone and they are recovering what they can get their hands on. the one thing the city officials wan...

That theres a couple city blocks there where buildings used to be, homes used to be. then you take a look at some of the newest construction thats on the beach itself. on pilings, on pillars, and those oceanfront homes are still there. but behind those oceanfront homes were all single-story ranch type buildings. where we hope no one seeking shelter during this onslaught of the water that came through here. this was surge. this was wind. this was equal to about a 30-minute ef-2 tornado being righ...

Built to withstand 120 mile an hour winds. what nobody can really ultimately stop, however, is when the storm surge comes from the gulf of mexico. that wall of water at 12 foot comes in and just pushes straight through. first of all, the force is incredible. so some of the things they have tried to build here are walls that would actually give way when the water came through but keep the structure itself in place so the pilings that go into the sand deep here will hold the structures in place. t...

Waves are approaching peoples properties. you can see some stairs there that people built to get out to the beach, theyre getting hit with some of the waves. if you look on this pier, i am told by some local residents that live here, one of the local residents that lives here, those pilings at the end are where low tide would be, and high tide comes up halfway through this. its almost completely underwater, especially when waves come up. you can see how high this foam is coming up into this pers...

River. so it was constant wave action. beating up against basically our flooring with water seeping in through the sliding glass door and up on the deck and coming up under the flooring. the conditions right now have allowed to us actually take a breath. the wind has died down. weve still got a lot of rain but conditions are actually a little bit lighter in comparison. >> what have you been seeing through the day outside your window? >> it is just unnerving. lots of debris. there are refrigerato...

Conditions? >> right now there are some wind gusts occasionally and some rain that started two hours ago. it is getting worse little by little but right now it is not bad at all. heather: why did you decide to ride it out? were you under mandatory evacuation? >> we are under mandatory evacuation where we live. i am a retired nurse. my husband, retired law enforcement, kind of against our grain to leave. we are very prepared. we have a generator and draft and provisions and we have a home with pi...

Feet high. and behind that they have the houses on the beaches. and in north carolina, the building codes are very strict. same with south carolina. so you have to have the house on the stilts, on the pilings and on top of that. what you have to picture in this area of the 7 to 11 feet. you have the normal high tide and you add 11 feet to that. well, thats going to be over the top of the dunes. now maybe some of those houses are at the 7 to 11 foot height. but this doesnt even take into account ...

Thats worst case. thats not going to happen. can that will we really see something that bad? six or nine feet. you have floating cars. and peoples first floor covered. >> it depends on how low the elevation is. eastern north carolina is relatively flat. houston and even some of the below sea level. new orleans. a lot of eastern north carolina has a little bit of elevation. i dont think well see nine feet of water up to a rooftop. well see the houses the building codes are strict. they get a hurr...

Fran rolled through the area in 1996. describe to me what the scene was like when a ten-foot storm surge destroyed the place. >> docks were flowing completely off the pilings and theyll be everywhere. the boats we find if the wind is strong enough, theyll come up over and everywhere. theyll end up on the street. it will be a big devastation is what it will be like. >> thats what you all anticipate here in the coming days. back in 1996, you were a firefighter. you were living in carolina beach, o...