May 31 – OLD ORCHARD BEACH – The seven-mile stretch of sandy Old Orchard Beach – one of the most recognizable stretches of Maine’s southern coastline – looks noticeably different this year.
Back-to-back storms in January caused severe erosion that wiped out the dunes, changed the shape of the beach and exposed hazards that city officials say they never faced. At least five feet of sand was washed away near the pier, exposing portions of support columns that are normally buried. And new sandbanks off the coast cause rip currents.
As lifeguards stood watch over the water and beachgoers lay on the sand Friday morning, Fire Chief John Gilboy described the storms’ impact to members of the state’s Infrastructure Rebuilding and Resilience Commission, who gathered in Old Orchard Beach to hear from city officials York County heard extensive damage from two storms in January.
Gilboy pointed to an old outflow pipe and a rocky ledge under the pier that have always been hidden beneath the sand.
“We’ve never seen this one before,” he said.
City officials from Old Orchard Beach to Kittery described extensive damage in their communities, detailed ongoing efforts to repair their infrastructure and said they need support to help them prepare for future storms. They also called on the state to provide small communities with more guidance and support as they navigate the complex and time-consuming process of obtaining reimbursements from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Friday’s listening session was the second for the commission since Gov. Janet Mills created it on May 21 in response to a series of disastrous storms that ravaged Maine in December and January. The winter storms caused an estimated $90 million in damage to public infrastructure ranging from Kittery to Eastport and inland to collapsed roads and culverts in the western mountains, according to state claims to FEMA.
The committee plans to tour Maine to see how the state can help those whose needs don’t fit neatly into federal disaster assistance categories. Hours after its formation, the 24-member board held its first meeting in Stonington, the state’s most lucrative lobster port, where they heard from city officials and lobstermen about the extensive damage to the working waterfront.
In York County, county emergency officials told the committee about preparing for January’s storms, unprecedented flooding and erosion, and ongoing cleanup efforts as they prepare for future storms. They showed photos of faded seawalls and decimated dunes and videos of the storm surge that flooded the streets and water pouring into a basement.
While storms are nothing new, there has been a noticeable shift in their frequency and intensity, said Megan Arsenault, deputy director of the York County Emergency Management Agency. She said the agency is working with communities across the province on mitigation and building “bigger, better, stronger.”
Sen. Donna Bailey, D-York, whose district includes Old Orchard Beach and Saco, said she is grateful the governor formed the commission because it is critical that federal, state, county, local communities and private property owners real estate collaboration. She said Camp Ellis “has been the canary in the coal mine for quite some time.”
“People living now in places like Ocean Park have had a taste of what Camp Ellis has been experiencing for decades,” she said. “Unfortunately, we all know it’s only going to get worse.”
INNOVATIVE STORM DAMAGE
By the time the storm hit Old Orchard Beach in January, city crews had been preparing for days. But nothing could really prepare them for the amount of rain and storm surge that flooded streets and homes and closed off large parts of the city.
“Within minutes there were places we couldn’t get to,” Gilboy said.
Firefighters waded through waist-deep water to reach a garage that was on fire. With no access for fire trucks, Gilboy rode a public works front-end loader to get across flooded roads. Propane tanks were floating everywhere. At one point, Gilboy got out of the vehicle and found himself in the water above his head.
Crews used a box truck to evacuate stranded residents and borrowed an airboat from the Maine Warden Service to reach inaccessible parts of Ocean Park. It was impossible for mutual aid teams from Saco and Scarborough to come to town to assist with emergencies.
“We couldn’t reach people who have never seen floodwaters,” Gilboy said.
Rep. Lori Gramlich, D-Old Orchard Beach, who lives in Ocean Park and is executive director of the nonprofit Ocean Park Association, called the storms a tragedy for the city.
“It’s traumatizing to see these photos again. I’ve never seen anything like this in my life,” she said.
City Manager Diana Asanza said Old Orchard Beach is still recovering from the January storms five months later. Homes and businesses along the beach are still at risk because the dunes that protected them “did their job” but are now gone.
“If we keep seeing storms like this, we won’t be so lucky next time,” Asanza said.
Patrick Fox, Saco’s public works director, told committee members that he has spent the past 20 years putting band-aids on “the most eroding 2,000 feet of Maine’s coastline.”
Fox said he has always pointed to “great mitigation options,” such as raising roads, but many of those projects are not an option because there is not enough time, space or money for them.
Kennebunkport City Manager Laurie Smith said city officials in the region have been working together to share ideas on how to prepare for storms and become more resilient. She described the challenge of deciding which infrastructure projects to tackle and securing funding, and seeing the impact on people in the community.
“Their dreams were lost, their possessions were lost, their visions of families coming here and enjoying it were lost,” she said.
After weathering the January storm and seeing the extensive damage — including a road so undulating that she said it “looked like a wave went through the sidewalk” — Smith went home feeling defeated.
“I can’t tell you how heartbroken I was,” she said.
THE IMPACT IN OCEAN PARK
After meeting with officials from the local fire station on Friday, Gilboy led the committee on a tour of Ocean Park and Old Orchard Beach to highlight some of the hardest-hit areas.
On New Salt Road, Gilboy and Gramlich described how the flooding was so bad that Goosefare Brook flowed over a bridge, forcing officials to close Seaside Avenue. In the basement of a house, flooding deformed the floor and filled the room with sand – something Gilboy had never seen before.
As the group walked to the beach, Gramlich pointed out the debris still tangled in the rose bushes lining the narrow streets and an outdoor shower that floated through the neighborhood during the storm. At one home, crews were cleaning up and repairing the property, she said.
As committee members spoke with local officials on the beach, Steve Gardner walked across the sand from the cottage his family had owned for decades on Porter Road. It’s the last house on the beach before the Saco city limit and he said it has survived numerous storms.
But Gardner, who is from Waltham, Massachusetts, said the January storms changed the beach in ways he never imagined. The dunes that once perched high in front of the cottage have now been washed away, exposing the house to the ocean. For the first time, there was more than a foot of standing water on the ground floor of the house, because the water was so high.
“We’ve been here since 1985 and it’s the worst I’ve ever seen,” he said.
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