Hurricane Hugo: What’s Different 25 Years After The Storm
By Joey Holleman, The State (Columbia, S.C.) | |
McClatchy-Tribune Information Services |
Two of the most striking episodes of SC ETV's "NatureScene" detail trips to
The landscape of the island was altered remarkably ... but not permanently. Nature, especially in a place like
"What everybody expected to happen has happened," said naturalist
The year after the storm's high winds and storm surge destroyed many of the largest canopy trees, the acorn crop was abundant, Mancke said. So was sunlight, which encouraged fast growth of new trees and, especially, vines.
"Every time I went back, you could see that nature was beginning to put the pieces back together," Mancke said.
After his most recent trip, Mancke noted that the major difference from pre-Hugo is the height of the pines. Hugo snapped all of the tallest pines, and they take longer to reach that height. "They're going up now though," he said.
Isle of
The next day his business was gone. The roof blew off the former gas station he had converted into an office on
"Everything I own is post-Hugo," Carroll said.
Every home on both islands had some damage. Some were completely gone. It took five years for Carroll's business to recover, but many island property owners used insurance checks to build bigger homes that boosted rental or sales income for realtors.
"As painful as it was, and I hate to say this, it was probably one of the better things that happened to me professionally," Carroll said.
While new homes are built better to withstand storms, Carroll still thinks some people are building too close to the ocean. He hopes newcomers will listen to those who were around in 1989 when the next storm approaches.
"I never thought a storm would do the damage it did," Carroll said. "I thought they were crying wolf. They weren't. I wouldn't stay in
He began hearing trees fall around his home on
Between Darby's house and his brother-in-law's house nearby, he counted 38 huge trees across the road. Power was out everywhere. Fish were floundering in his azalea bushes.
Darby's family didn't have power or running water for 28 days at their home. They pulled buckets of water from the lake to flush their toilets. "We greeted the power company workers like they were the soldiers going into
Darby believes the region is better equipped to handle another Hugo. Emergency managers have better tools, from vehicles to radios. People older than about 35 have vivid memories of what Hugo was like.
"Most everybody has a chain saw now," Darby said. "If they see a storm coming, they'll have gas in their four-wheelers and their generators."
A few hours later, she knew better. She and husband Glen and their two young sons hunkered down as their house shook in the pitch black of powerless
Inland residents closer to cities such as
Their daughter, Julie, was in college in
Many of the historic homes in
That Christmas, plenty of
But the true long-term impact of Hugo in that area "has been that we take very seriously the idea that storms can come here," said
Timber industry
In the immediate aftermath of Hugo, timber growers in the swath leveled by the storm were walking around in a daze. What do you do when entire forests of trees are toppled or snapped? They didn't have access to enough people and equipment to harvest all the downed timber, and there was little market for it anyway.
"It was like having 300 pounds of steak and having no refrigeration," said
It took two years to salvage the majority of the pines, and some damaged pines were salvaged even later. Around 1992, "it was a relief to quit focusing on the salvage effort and to move on to reforestation," Stewart said.
Many timber farmers treat their crop like a savings account, cutting trees when they need to send a child to college or make a down payment on a new home. Hugo wiped out many of those savings accounts. Hugo also killed a few mills equipped to handle the high-quality timber that took longest to regrow. But most timber farmers rebounded financially and replanted, and trees remain the major farm crop in the state.
A quarter-century later, the industry is different, and in better shape than pre-Hugo in many ways. More pines now are cut earlier for use as low-grade wood, thereby cutting the typical growth rotation by about eight years. Genetic research also has improved, along with overall use of technology in the industry. But Stewart noted those changes happened throughout the Southeast, not just in the swath hit by Hugo.
The main impact of Hugo on the forestry industry 25 years later is psychological. "Anybody in a hurricane area who has lived through a storm like that is always worried another one could come," Stewart said.
Emergency Management/
"We had rehearsed, but I don't think we had any concept of the amount of damage that storm was going to cause," Livingston said.
But he also believes the state emergency management officials, including the State and
"I think we pre-positioned people where they needed to be," he said. "I think we made the public very much aware, and we were very proactive in keeping the public informed. And that saved lives on the front end, but it also set the stage for the recovery that occurred afterward. And I think the recovery was really the amazing part."
Everyone, from every walk of life, pitched in to help restore the state.
"We have people that are very self-reliant and they are concerned about their neighbor," Livingston said. "They're concerned about their own family. And they're just going to take things into their hands and do what is right -- not take this as an opportunity to go down and loot downtown
Hugo changed emergency preparation. Multiple state agencies get together every year for hurricane practice sessions. The state has many more aircraft available to help with rescue and restoration efforts. They have a mobile air traffic control unit that can move in quickly if a local airport is wiped out.
The State Guard now has an engineering company that can build temporary bridges. Guard units' frequent deployments to
But equally as important, Livingston said, is what the public learned from that storm. "It changed the thought processes for all South Carolinians who were there," he said. "What I'm concerned about is the citizens who have moved in since Hugo, they may not remember just how devastating that storm was."
He suggests newcomers talk with Hugo veterans. They'll hear similar stories of perseverance and cooperation.
"If we'd have had riots, if we'd have had people trying to take advantage of the situation, if we had had people that just sat on their rear ends and waited for somebody to help, it would have been very difficult," Livingston said, "and it would not have been the picture that we remember now."
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