ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla.—Tropical Storm Nicole pummeled beach communities on Florida’s Atlantic coastline from just above the southern tip to the northernmost corner of the state on Nov. 10, raking away sand dunes, damaging structures, and flooding buildings and streets.
At least five people were killed in its wake, including two who were electrocuted by a downed power line while driving, according to a report by AccuWeather.
But as so often happens in the aftermath of difficult times, the battering also brought out a sense of camaraderie as Floridians faced the effects of the weather together.
In inland Green Cove Springs, members of the Benevolent and Protective Order of the Elks stopped in to check on their gathering place, which sits on the west bank of the St. Johns River.
There, they found Al Williams, who carries the title of the fraternal organization’s exalted ruler, ready to greet them in a slim strip of high-and-dry land near the adjacent highway.
“Who’s going to give me a piggyback ride to the door?” Williams teased, assuring bystanders that, although water lapped all around and under the slightly elevated building, it hadn’t seeped inside.
And the Elks are used to that. The normally placid waterway overflows its banks during every storm the size of Nicole, Williams told The Epoch Times.
So instead of fretting, Williams joked under gray skies with the Elks members. He threatened to insist that one of them come and remove his boat, moored nearby and brought by the rising waters over a bulkhead at the edge of the parking lot.
He pointed out a large white boat that had broken free of its tether and was moving, unhindered, on a path toward the club’s newly built dock.
“It won’t hit it,” Williams said.
On the Atlantic Coast 30 miles to the east, scores of locals at St. Augustine Beach leaned against the wind in the late afternoon after the rain stopped and ventured out to stroll beside thrashing waves.
Some marveled at the loss of dunes that only the previous day had lined the beach in two soldier-like rows parallel to the shore.
“It looks so different,” a woman told The Epoch Times as she surveyed the area once dominated by undulating surfside hills.
Nicole knocked many flat, leaving behind debris-strewn ruins. Other dunes remained, but with newly jagged sides, where thrashing waves chiseled out chunks.
That’s a problem because dunes provide a natural barrier between the water’s edge and the buildings closest to the beach. Dunes also serve as a critical habitat for countless creatures.
Dune restoration projects, expensive and time-consuming, will be necessary now in many communities beaten down by the storm.
Damage from Nicole wasn’t limited to the coastline.
Inland neighborhoods, especially near the Intracoastal Waterway and the north-flowing St. Johns River, experienced heavy flooding in low areas. Rising water there damaged homes and made many roads impassable.
Todd Schultz, a 30-year St. Augustine resident, goes out looking for drivers in need of rescue after every big storm, he told The Epoch Times, “because I have a big, stupid truck.”
He used that truck, emblazoned with the message “We the People” across the windshield, to save an elderly stranger trapped in his car on Nov. 10. The man became stranded on a flooded street while driving to investigate destruction left by the storm.
Shortly after, while driving along a nearby street, Schultz spotted an opportunity to help.
In moments, he was knee-deep in coffee-colored water, looking for why the man’s car was stuck. Finding it hung up on a concrete drain hidden below the water, Schultz tied a rope to it. He secured the other end to his lifted truck, emblazoned with stickers supporting former President Donald Trump.
“I want to save him a couple-hundred bucks,” said Schultz, a former helicopter pilot in the National Guard.
Although a watching police officer had summoned a tow truck, Schultz refused to give up, even after numerous failed attempts to dislodge the vehicle.
“We gotta take care of each other,” he said. “I saw he served in the army in Vietnam. Leave no man behind!”
After about 30 minutes, Schultz freed the car, gently dragging it off the concrete platform. As bystanders cheered, he shrugged and smiled.
The scene illustrated why it’s important to never drive through water, according to a police officer watching the rescue. Danger could be just below the surface.
