CURRITUCK — Currituck’s Atlantic shoreline appears to be creeping ever closer to residents’ homes in Corolla and other parts of the county’s Outer Banks due to shoreline erosion over the last several years.
That’s according to Ken Willson, a senior project manager with the Wilmington-based firm Coastal Protection Engineering. The firm has been conducting beach stability surveys of Currituck’s near 25 miles of Atlantic shoreline since 2020. Earlier this week, Willson presented the findings from the last survey, which was in 2023, to Currituck commissioners.
“This data that we’re going to talk about today is almost a year old,” Willson said. “And within about probably a month to six weeks we’ll collect the 2024 data.”
According to Willson, Currituck’s Atlantic shoreline is about 23 miles long and runs from North Carolina’s border with Virginia south to neighboring Dare County. The survey divided the shoreline into four sections, but Willson’s presentation focused mainly on the Corolla section, which includes the beaches between the wild horse fence north of the unincorporated community and south to Yaupon Lane.
Willson displayed a cross section of data and an aerial photograph that included the shoreline, the dunes and the homes beyond the dunes. A black line overlaying the length of the beach indicated the wet-dry line, or the point where the water’s edge meets dry sand.
He said by using data compiled over several years, engineers can measure the distance that the wet-dry line has moved from one year to another to get an idea of the rate the beach has narrowed due to erosion.
“If we did that going all the way back to 2009 and compared it to 2023, we can create a rate by comparing that distance and figuring out the years between them,” he said. “That’s what we’ve done.”
The survey’s rate of shoreline progression inland was based on projections of 10, 20, and 30 years and stipulated what the results would be if the county took no action to protect the beaches.
On the same cross section, a purple line that ran adjacent to the black line but between several homes indicated the approximate location of the wet-dry line in 30 years.
In that scenario, 154 homes would be impacted by the encroaching ocean in 30 years, according to Willson. In the 20-year projection, 43 homes would be affected and in 10 years two homes could be lost.
Willson also presented a graph that compared how much of the beach has been lost to erosion over a period of 14 years — from August 2009 to June 2023 — and over a shorter period from May 2020 to June 2023.
The Corolla section lost an average of 5.6 feet per year in the long term, for a total of 78.4 feet, he said. In the short term, the loss was much less at 1.3 feet per year.
To illustrate how long 78 feet is, Willson presented a photo of a tractor trailer.
“Well this semi-truck is probably about 70 to 75 feet,” he said. “So, between 2009 and 2023 on average in Corolla, they’ve lost about a tractor trailer worth of beach.”
CPE is also assisting the county to develop a beach management plan, which Willson described as “a framework for management for protection and restoration of the county’s beaches.”
The county must identify priorities for the plan that include goals it hopes to achieve, Willson said. He said examples could include reducing risk to oceanfront property and public roads, providing sufficient beach recreation and preserving the ecological system, such as sea turtle nesting.
Other aspects of the plan will include a feasibility analysis and development of beach management concepts for analysis. Those concepts could include “targeted localized dune restoration” or “truck-hauling sand in,” Willson said.
“Are we just using sand fencing and vegetation to try to restore the dunes?” he asked. “Are we talking about full-on beach nourishment along certain sections of the beach?”
There are many concepts and options, Willson said.
“We don’t want to leave anything off of the table,” he said. “We want to openly consider all of these beach management concepts.”
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