Hurricane (Typhoon) — Pender, North Carolina

2005-09-14 to 2005-09-15 · Pender, North Carolina

Event narrative

On September 12th, Hurricane Warnings were issued from South Santee river to Cape Lookout...with Ophelia centered about 140 miles SSE of Myrtle Beach SC. At 11 am on the 14th...Category 1 Ophelia was centered about 25 miles southeast of Cape Fear. The large eyewall (50 miles in diameter) was over New Hanover...Pender and Brunswick counties...with hurricane strength wind gusts reported at Wrightsville Beach. (79 mph). There were unofficial reports of wind gusts to 84 mph at Bald Head Island and Kure Beach. No other stations reported a measured gust to hurricane strength...with most observing stations reporting wind gusts between 35 to 50 mph. Rainfall was heaviest in the eastern portion of Brunswick county...with over 17 inches reported. 12 inches was observed on the Sep 14th...and 5 inches on the 13th...in advance of the hurricane. Average rainfall over Brunswick...New Havover...and Pender counties ranged from 6 to 10 inches. Hurricane warnings over South Carolina were lowered to Tropical Storm warnings by 11am on the 14th...with warnings dropped entirely over South Carolina by 5 pm. The storm continued to track slowly northeast...with all warnings in the Cape Fear region dropped around 5 am on September 15th.Damage over the area was mainly minor roof damage and flooding...over flood prone areas. In Topsail Beach, cosmetic damage was reported to 350 homes. Flooding closed major thoroughfares...especially from Shallotte river to Supply. There were moderate reports of downed trees...and the utility company reported over 51,000 people without power at the height of the storm. Beach erosion was also a problem. A longshore current gouged a 5 ft escarpment along the coast of New Hanover and Pender counties. Damage to the area and the cost for clean up would be $6 million for Pender and New Hanover counties...with $2.3 million for Brunswick county. Most of the money would go to the cleanup of storm debris.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 5478483. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.