I just got internet back last nite. Even phone internet was dead here.
Regarding Snow's cut, I am 15m north and have not been down there. The ICW in my area (at n. end of Wrightsville beach) is fine, markers in place, no big change in shoaling. I suspect Snow's to be ok, but the river is raging downstream and is full of debris. If you can go offshore, I would.
My house, dock and boat survived ok. A little dock damage at piling guides that I have already fixed. Boat was stretched across the creek with nylon and rode it out fine. Still have to fix dock wiring to get the lights back, but should not be a big deal.
Water came up about 6-7' above normal high tide. We had almost a pure onshore wind with eye to the southwest, and that piled the water in. Docks and houses exposed to fetch really caught hell, especially the docks. I'm in a protected creek (boat basin) so very little fetch. Glad for that!!
Worst thing was in one of the rain bands, there were some sort of tornado or whatever that took down most of our trees and power poles in a matter of seconds. I was down on the boat checking it out and it surged against the lines like I have never seen. Like trying to jump out of the water. Over as quick as it started. But all ok. Worst damage on the boat was the wind snapped off a VHF antenna.
Next morning find a few hundred yards of three phase power lines, poles (and internet cable) in the dirt. It took Duke about a week to fix. I was impressed, they bull-dogged the job and got it done. Cable company was much slower, but that is more of luxury so ok.
Diesel 8kW Kubota gennie was a trooper. Ran solid for seven days except a couple stops to check oil. Ran both AC's in the house, well pump, and all the little stuff. Had to shut off the AC's to run the water heater, but no big deal there.
Had lots of friends over to enjoy the AC and quiet. Some slept over. Gennie is in a detached garage so in the house you can barely hear it.
Girlfriend lives a mile away and power was out there. She unloaded her fridge into mine so there was plenty to feast on.
For a while there were no food markets open, so even with power some people were running out of food. When the Publix opened, there was a line of people and a clog of cars. When a couple gas stations opened, cars lined up like crazy.
I had bought 110 gal of diesel for the gennie, I have not yet dipped the two barrels, but I think I burned about 70gal in 7days. Not too bad. I avoided needing to get any sort of fuel in the panic.
After about a week, power was mostly on in commercial places, but flooding had interrupted normal supply routes. Stores started running out of things pretty quick. Like BEER. Fortunately our wine and beer stocks held up.
Middle Sound Loop rd washed out at the south end of the basin, so it is now just Middle Sound rd. The debris from the wash out wrecked the docks at a friend of mine's rental dock, he's got a lot of repair and dredging ahead of him. The state might help out as it was their stuff that destroyed his. We shall see.
Now have to deal with like 37 tons of shredded vegetation on the property. Not in the mood for it, yet.
That flooding inland is the big part of the story. Lots of folks really lost most everything, and inland most have very modest resources. Lots of folks hurting there.
In this case, you need to avoid the Waccamaw (sp?) River. There are some notices about the condition of the ICW thru there after the storm.
