While vacationing on Pine Island the first full week of August, my spouse and I had a somewhat unexpected experience. We watched as a tropical disturbance in the Gulf of Mexico became Tropical Storm Debby two days after we arrived and, despite our hopes, passed Pine Island the afternoon of Aug. 4.
Intermittent bands of heavy rain accompanied by wind gusts of up to 60 mph weren’t all that bothersome, but then we heard a storm surge of up to three feet was expected at high tide.
Looking out the back door of the lovely cottage we had rented, we watched as the canal at the back of the property filled with sea water up to the docks as it always does at high tide. Then the water began creeping onto the property. Pilings disappeared, the dock disappeared as did all of the flora on the property. The water kept steadily rising. It was actually flowing toward us.
Now we were concerned. I’m guessing the cottage was about 120 feet from the canal, but that meant nothing to the surge. It just kept coming, flowing under the building and completely surrounding it. The water reached the top of the first step leading onto the porch. We actually saw a school of fish swim by.
I found myself thinking about Hurricane Ian and how its 8 to 10-foot storm surge driven by 140 mph winds devastated this beautiful barrier island. What we were experiencing was nothing compared to that. But it was, nevertheless, quite disconcerting.
“Most people have a hard time visualizing what storm surge really is,” said Jennifer Hubbard, warning coordination meteorologist for the National Weather Service Tampa Bay office in Ruskin. “It forms initially when the storm is out over the open ocean.”
According to the National Hurricane Center, “storm surge is an abnormal rise of water generated by a storm, over and above the predicted astronomical tides. It’s primarily caused by the strong onshore winds of a hurricane or tropical storm.
The wind circulation around the eye of the storm causes a vertical circulation in the ocean that’s disrupted by the ocean bottom once the storm reaches shallower waters near the coast. The water can no longer move downward, so it begins to move upward and inland, resulting in storm surge.”
The maximum amount of storm surge depends on a number of factors: storm intensity, forward speed, size (radius of maximum winds), angle of approach to the coast, and the shape and characteristics of the coastline.
LYNN KESSEL PHOTO
This is a view from the back porch of the cottage we rented on Pine Island after Tropical Storm Debby’s storm surge came in at high tide. Sea water completely surrounded the property and was under and around the building. Even though modest by Hurricane Ian standards, the experience was unnerving, to say the least.
“The push of water onshore with the storm is a constant, steady rise of water through the event, with water not able to go back offshore until winds shift on the back side of the tropical cyclone,” Hubbard said. “It more resembles a fast and steady rising tide that just continues to rise higher and higher for sometimes several hours, depending on the forward speed of the storm. It’s not like one big wave hitting all at once.
“It’s the force of the continuous onshore push and weight of that water that causes so much damage,” she said, “lifting and moving vehicles, boats, virtually anything in its path and causing structural damage to buildings. It’s why evacuation orders are issued.”
The 2024 hurricane season is currently in its peak, and it will continue through Nov. 30. So if you live by the coast, which so many of us do in South Shore, please heed any evacuation order. Storm surge is no laughing matter.
Lois Kindle is a freelance writer and columnist for The Observer News. Contact her at lekindle@aol.com/.