Episcopal Press and News
Hurricane Irene drenches East Coast as Episcopalians shelter neighbors, clean up
Episcopal News Service. August 29, 2011 [082911-01]
Matthew Davies and Mary Frances Schjonberg
Linda Ellis and Bill Lynch skirted downed trees and power lines in and around the graveyard behind All Saints Memorial Church in Navesink, New Jersey, on Aug. 29, surveying the damage done by Hurricane Irene.
Three "ginormous" trees fell out from the graveyard onto a street, pulling down utility wires and snapping a power pole, said Ellis, the parish's senior warden and a lifelong member of All Saints.
Standing on a driveway behind the church and gazing up at the littered graveyard, she pointed to a shattered tree trunk. "The whole trunk looks like it spiraled off," she said.
Branches and parts of tree trunks covered gravestones and left wood chips flung among the graves.
Irene's winds cracked a window in the rectory next to the church, but Ellis said they found no other structural damage.
"We're fortunate," said Lynch, the parish's treasurer, as he prepared to call the Church Insurance Co. to inquire about whether All Saints' policy applies to the removal of downed trees.
"Our only concern is how to pay for it if the insurance doesn't," Ellis said. "And anyway, the deductibles are high."
It was a scene no doubt repeated from North Carolina to Maine on Aug. 29 as Episcopalians joined their neighbors to clean up in the aftermath of Hurricane Irene.
St. Paul's Church in Centreville, Maryland, in the Diocese of Easton, sustained some structural damage when a tree fell onto the building and "penetrated in the nave," according to a note on the church's website.
St. Andrew's Church in Newark, New Jersey, also had a tree fall on its roof, according to Nina Nicholson, director of communications and technology for the Diocese of Newark.
As the storm approached, many Episcopalians also offered help to their neighbors. For instance, All Saints Episcopal Church in Lakewood, New Jersey, provided access to shelter for a camp of homeless people on the edge of town.
The Diocese of North Carolina announced three days before Irene hit that several congregations were ready to open their parish halls and provide short-term temporary shelter "for our sisters and brothers in the Diocese of East Carolina who may be in need of it."
In the dioceses of Virginia and Washington, Irene's arrival was the second time in less than a week that residents had to cope with the force of nature. On Aug. 23, a magnitude-5.8 earthquake struck about 85 miles northwest of Washington, D.C., significantly damaging Washington National Cathedral, among other buildings.
The cathedral sustained further damage during the hurricane, with high winds causing loose masonry to fall from the building and further displacing some of the pinnacles, said Joseph Alonso, mason foreman, during a live webcast on Aug. 29.
Many Episcopal Church congregations in dioceses along the East Coast canceled their Sunday services on Aug. 28 because of predictions that Irene would hit that day.
Trinity Church in Asbury Park, New Jersey, three blocks from the Atlantic, was one of those congregations. Trinity was also among many that took pre-storm precautions. On Aug. 26, members and staffers moved books, pew cushions and altar dressings from flood-susceptible areas in the church to "higher ground" in the facilities, according to an email message to members.
"We got off with hardly any damage," Jill Osis, parish administrator, told ENS Aug. 29.
Some water came into the church, especially the undercroft, she said, and some ceiling tiles fell from in the gymnasium in the school wing.
"It's incredible because the park across the street had several trees down and several limbs that had fallen off and were scattered all over the park, and we had nothing," she said, adding that three large trees on the Trinity property lost little more than leaves and small branches.
The storm that grew into Hurricane Irene began Aug. 20 east of the Leeward Islands. It gathered strength in the Caribbean as it caused flooding and death. By Aug. 24, Irene was a category-three hurricane with sustained winds of 120 miles per hour. The storm took a turn the next day and began to move north off the east coast of Florida. By the evening of Aug. 26, Irene was bearing down on southeastern North Carolina.
The hurricane lost strength and was a category-one storm when it made its first of three landfalls about 7:30 a.m. EDT Aug. 27 near Cape Lookout, North Carolina. Irene remained a category-one storm, but with slightly less powerful winds when it made landfall about 5:35 a.m. EDT at Little Egg Inlet, New Jersey. It was the first hurricane to make landfall in New Jersey in more than a century. By the time Irene's center moved over New York City at 9:00 a.m. EDT, it had deteriorated into a tropical storm.
Irene's rains Aug. 27 and Aug. 28 rains inundated inland New Jersey and New York, along with New England, causing flash flooding, bridge collapses and road wash-outs. In addition, Irene's arrival coincided a new moon and hit in New Jersey and New York near the morning high tide, which were the highest of the month. High tide caused larger storm surges and the ground, already saturated with rain from earlier storms, could not absorb the water. Experts expect flooding to get worse in the coming days.
At least 28 deaths in nine states from Florida to Connecticut have been attributed to Irene according to an Associated Press report. The storm has caused an estimated $3.1 billion in damages and more than 4 million homes and businesses were without power at the height of the outages.
In the Diocese of Massachusetts, Communications Director Tracy Sukraw told ENS there'd been no reports of injuries or serious property damage to any church buildings. "What we are hearing of is pretty widespread tree damage and some ongoing power outages," she said. "Relatively minor church building damage reported so far includes things like broken windows, some roof damage and, in a couple of places, minor basement/boiler room flooding."
Karin Hamilton, director of communications for the Diocese of Connecticut, said in an e-mail sent to ENS at 8:31 a.m. on Aug. 29 via her mobile phone that the diocesan offices were open but that she was at home with no power.
Meanwhile, in New York, the Episcopal Church Center closed on Aug. 29 due to limited subway and Long Island Railroad service, and no service on New Jersey Transit train lines -- following weekend closures -- and the likelihood of crowded trains.
Irene, the ninth named storm but the first hurricane of the 2011 season, dissipated over Quebec, Canada, on Aug. 29, six years to the day that Hurricane Katrina made landfall in Biloxi, Mississippi, later causing severe flooding in New Orleans, Louisiana, and ultimately causing more than 1,800 deaths.
Katie Mears, Episcopal Relief & Development manager for its U.S. disaster program, said Aug. 29 that the amount of damage from Irene "seems to vary widely from place to place."
"Some people were able to stay in their homes and are now just waiting for the power to come back on; others were evacuated and are returning to try and salvage what they can from their flood-soaked homes and businesses," she said in a press release.
"We are still in the very early stages of assessment and planning in partnership with local dioceses," said Mears. "I have been in contact with a number of the diocesan disaster coordinators from impacted areas, and they will be working with diocesan leadership to see what needs to be done and how churches can help."
The coordinators, appointed by bishops to help dioceses and their parishes create disaster preparedness plans and respond in emergency situations, receive training and support from Episcopal Relief & Development as part of its Disaster Preparedness Initiative, which was launched in 2010.
"We can see that the impacted dioceses have strengthened their networks, and their capacity to prepare," said Mears. "Not only do more dioceses and parishes have plans in place for how to deal with disasters, but the [coordinators] have built some really helpful connections with outside institutions and agencies. I have a lot of confidence in the ability of dioceses to respond to the situation in their areas, and of course we will be standing by to offer support as needed."
In the days leading up to the storm making landfall, many Episcopal dioceses along the East Coast posted details of disaster preparedness plans.
"We are still recovering from the tornadoes last spring and now are working on hurricane relief," the Rev. Canon Michael Buerkel Hunn, canon to the ordinary in the Diocese of North Carolina, told ENS. "We certainly learned a lot from the tornado relief efforts and our work with Episcopal Relief & Development and the Diocese of East Carolina. All of that has helped us be more prepared for Irene."
The Diocese of Long Island also shared information and resources from Episcopal Relief & Development, among others, on its website, via Facebook and Twitter, and in a special online newsletter to all clergy, parish administrators and wardens "in an attempt to help our parishes prepare for the coming storm," the Rev. John P. McGinty, communication director for the Diocese of Long Island, told ENS. "We updated these also during the storm on Facebook, for those who retained power."
McGinty said that while there are fallen trees and power lines still down, there have been no reports of significant property damage throughout the diocese. But "we do have the happy news of one birth during the storm, to the family of one of our priests."