Sometimes, tragically, the forces of Mother Earth cannot be controlled – as was seen last week in Rodanthe, North Carolina.
There, another beach house collapsed into the Atlantic Ocean — a scene that is becoming all too familiar for this Outer Banks community. It was located at 23214 Corbina Drive.
The destruction, caught on camera, serves as a stark reminder of the growing threats facing coastal homes in this vulnerable area. It was the seventh home to collapse on the seafront in just four years as rising sea levels, beach erosion and wild storms turn dream homes into waste fields.
Cape Hatteras National Seashore, now on a first-name basis with downed homes, is in contact with the owner but doesn’t expect to begin cleanup until next week, once the seas calm down.
Watch: House collapses into ocean on Outer Banks due to hurricane Ernesto swell. It is the seventh house to face destruction in a span of four years. The public is warned to stay clear.
INFO: https://t.co/dW3hSM96NZ
Video courtesy of Chicamacomico Banks Fire & Rescue. pic.twitter.com/W0SiE4kGEd
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David and Teresa Kern purchased the residence in 2019 for $339,000, records show. Teresa told The Post that they were aware her home had gone viral — and they were currently working on getting all the paperwork done to figure out what finances they could salvage.
The Kerns had purchased the property as a secondary vacation home, while their primary residence is in Hershey, Pennsylvania.
According to the previous listing, the house consisted of four bedrooms and two bathrooms, occupying about 1,500 square feet.
Built in 1973, the listing – now rather chilling – noted: “Watch dolphins play in the ocean from three levels of oceanfront decks at Dolphin’s Point. This charming home is located right on the ocean so your fun starts the moment you arrive! Feel the ocean breeze and smell the salty air from the porch swing, or sit in one of the chairs with a good book while listening to the sound of the waves on the shore.”
“That’s how it is with all these houses. Eventually when the ocean erodes enough of the beach, it pulls the foundation out from under the house. As it lost the beach, it lost the sand under its piers and eventually the house just collapsed,” Dare County Manager Bobby Outten told The Post.
As Rodanthe’s 200 residents saw another part of their community disappear, local officials warned that more homes are at risk than Hurricane Ernesto, even though miles out to sea, dangerous waves and high tides erupt.
The options for those looking ahead to the ocean’s progress are bleak. Homeowners can pay big bucks to move their homes inland, pay to demolish them, or wait for the inevitable collapse and hope their insurance covers the loss.
“In short, the individual homeowner doesn’t have many options,” Outten said. “In our state, there aren’t many tools in the toolbox, if you will, to protect against ocean erosion.”
In an effort to avoid further damage, Cape Hatteras National Seashore launched a pilot program to purchase and destroy two at-risk properties. But as David Hallac, superintendent of national parks in eastern North Carolina, explained, funds are limited, leaving many homeowners out of luck.
Hallac also emphasized that these collapses are not only a problem for property owners.
When a house falls, it shatters into thousands of pieces, spreading debris for miles and posing significant risks to both beachgoers and the environment. After Friday’s collapse, the National Park Service strongly advised visitors to stay away from Rodanthe’s beaches and waters.
Efforts to replenish sand along the beach have been tried in other parts of Dare County, but Rodanthe has yet to see that kind of investment. Outten estimated the cost would be in the tens of millions — money that just isn’t there.
The only solution is beach food, Outten explained. Beach nourishment is the process of adding sand to a beach to replace what has been washed away by waves and storms. This helps prevent erosion, protects coastal property and keeps the beach looking nice for visitors. It’s like replenishing a shoreline with sand to keep it from disappearing over time.
“This area could benefit from beach food. But we don’t have enough money to afford it at present. It’s a $40 million or more project to feed that beach one time, and you can’t feed it once you have to do it over and over again.”
Great ratings for a place like Rodanthe, there should be beach food every five years or so.
For now, the residents of Rodanthe are left to watch and wait as the ocean creeps closer, claiming homes one by one.
While Outten couldn’t comment on the Kerns’ decision to buy the house in 2019, he explains that beach erosion has long been a blight.
“This is not something that just happened, you know, this weekend. It’s been going on there for a long time,” Kern said.
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