Long Island residents deal with familiar flooding as latest storm lashes coast
JONES BEACH, N.Y. -- Flooding was felt across Long Island on Monday, but coastal communities and low-lying areas of Nassau and Suffolk were hit especially hard.
Officials are assessing the damage now that the heavy rain has passed.
At places like Jones Beach, the coastal storm sent ocean water into places where it doesn't belong. The 20-foot wave crests, a wild sight at the ocean shore, flooded the expansive sand at Jones Beach and deluged part of the central mall games area. Even the orchestra seats at Northwell Health Theater were underwater.
Amazingly, no long-term damage is expected.
"Everything's raised, so it's designed where the water flows in and then recedes. Here, we're pretty fortunate that we haven't seen much damage whatsoever. At Gilgo State Park, we've seen significant erosion, and that park is now closed," said New York State Parks Regional Director George Gorman.
On Fire Island, the ocean breached the dunes and got dangerously close to homes. It prompted urgent calls from residents to the Army Corps of Engineers for the agency to extend its upcoming sand replenishment plans to cover most of the barrier island, not just part of it.
"We're feet away from houses in our community, having the dune come right underneath their house," said Thomas Ruskin, with the Seaview Association. "It makes no sense to just do the western portion when you have the most catastrophic damage to the eastern portion."
High tide brought back familiar floods to the low-lying streets of Lindenhurst, where residents said they never quite get used to it.
"When the tide recedes, it'll recede. That's why we put more topsoil down," said Bruce Howard. "It looks like it's a lake there. That will go out, it will all go out. And if it doesn't, we move."
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At the Nautical Mile in Freeport, the same sort of street flooding may soon be a thing of the past, once seven new pumping stations are installed in a few months.
"We are changing it. We're slowly but surely putting in pumping stations to eliminate that nuisance flooding," said Mayor Robert Kennedy.
As the storm moves east, officials are also evaluating erosion in Montauk State Park. They're hoping the worst is behind them by high-tide Monday night.