RODANTHE — Following the collapse of an unoccupied house into the Atlantic Ocean in Rodanthe early Tuesday morning, debris spread along 15 miles of beach and had filled 53 pickup trucks as of Wednesday afternoon. And officials say there are two dozen more homes in danger.
The collapse of the two-story, five-bedroom, 2.5-bath house at 24131 Ocean Drive in Rodanthe, just south of Rodanthe Pier, led to a two-day closure of over a mile of beach.
Cape Hatteras National Seashore in a Thursday morning press release announced the reopening of approximately seven-tenths of a mile of the beach in front of Rodanthe Village. It said the current closure spanned approximately a quarter mile, from S. Holiday Boulevard to the north end of Ocean Drive in Rodanthe.
This is the sixth house in that stretch of Hatteras Island to collapse into the ocean in the past four years.
With local beach erosion rates that can exceed 10 feet a year and about two dozen other oceanfront houses currently threatened, there is a high probability for this to not be the last.
When the ocean washed away the house — a beach box built in 1970 — it removed the physical site for many cherished memories, according to a former renter.
“The first time I got there, I spun around in a circle: ‘We have surround-sound ocean!’” Helen George of Crozier, recalled in a Wednesday phone interview.
She had posted on social media that it was her and her husband’s favorite house to rent, and “it’s very sad to see her fall into the ocean.”
The couple rented the house each spring and fall for about six years. They held a ceremony at the house for George’s younger sister, who died of cancer; they also brought one of their dogs to vacation there before he died of cancer, she said.
“The Outer Banks is so peaceful and beautiful,” George said. “I’m an artist. Watching the patterns in the waves, the sky change and the colors, it’s just perfect.”
The house was named Winterobe when they began renting it, but the name changed to Mariner’s Compass after a few visits.
Property records show that the house’s ownership changed at least twice during that time.
In October 2019, Winterobe, LLC, sold the house to Carl Roger Grunthaner for $359,500. In July 2021, AFSCO, LLC, sold it to Heather Evans for $500,000.
The current owners of the house have a New York mailing address, according to online Dare County property records.
Dare County Planning Director Noah Gillam said power was cut to the house Feb. 9, 2022, because it was “de-certified for occupancy,” meaning it was deemed unsafe. Houses are generally de-certified for occupancy because of damage to their ingress/egress, septic or for both of those reasons, he said.
Twelve other houses in Rodanthe have been de-certified for occupancy, as are about 12 in Buxton, Gillam said Thursday.
The houses in some cases could be re-certified for occupancy — at least for a time — if owners fix damaged stairs, septic systems or other identified issues.
“We know where our hot spots are with erosion,” Gillam said. “It’s primarily the two miles north of Camp Hatteras.”
Gillam explained that staff goes to check on houses after wind or tide events, and the National Park Service also cooperates with his office. They see the houses from the beach side as they patrol the beaches of the Cape Hatteras National Seashore.
Many owners have relocated area houses westward on their lots to escape the ocean. Three houses north of Rodanthe are in the relocation process currently, Gillam said.
“Some houses on Ocean Drive don’t have any space on their lots where they can relocate,” he said, noting that five of the 12 houses de-certified for occupancy in Rodanthe are on that street.
The National Flood Insurance Program doesn’t pay out “until the house collapses,” and its policies cover up to $250,000, Gillam said.
Homeowners could get private flood insurance that pays more, but “not anything that’s backed federally,” he noted.
The ocean has claimed six unoccupied, privately owned houses in Rodanthe since May 2020, with four falling in a 13-month period. Two houses on Ocean Drive fell on the same day — May 10, 2022 — during a multiday nor’easter.
The park service bought two houses on East Beacon Road in Rodanthe last September and contracted with a Powells Point-based company for them to be demolished in planned events in mid-November.
Cleanup can take over a month after unplanned house collapses, according to Mike Dunn, the owner of W.M. Dunn Construction, which was awarded the park service contract. Dunn said Nov. 15 before the first planned demolition that he expected most of the debris from the first house to be removed by the end of that day.
David Hallac, superintendent of the National Parks of Eastern North Carolina, said before the first demolition that the erosion rate in that stretch of Rodanthe is about 10 feet a year.
Wind, currents and waves “spread low-density debris” from the most recent house collapse along an approximately 15-mile-long section of beach, from around the Richard Etheridge Bridge to off-road vehicle ramp 27, according to the park service’s Thursday press release.
On Tuesday, 49 Cape Hatteras National Seashore employees filled 31 pickup trucks with debris. They worked alongside personnel from Chicamacomico Banks Fire & Rescue and W.M. Dunn Construction, LLC, the contractor the homeowners hired, according to park service information.
On Wednesday, 16 volunteers checked in by Rodanthe Pier and participated in a planned cleanup event with approximately 25 park service employees, filling 22 pickup truckloads of debris, according to spokesperson Mike Barber.
The contractor was also working on the scene Wednesday, he said.
Park employees planned to continue cleaning up smaller debris on Thursday, both by foot and through use of the surf rake, a piece of heavy equipment that can collect some microdebris, Barber said.
“While it is an encouraging sign that enough debris has been collected to be able to reopen a portion of the beach, visitors should consider wearing hard-soled shoes and remain cautious on the beach and in the water in front of Rodanthe as pieces of debris continue to wash ashore,” the Thursday release.
