7th home collapses in Buxton fueled by Imelda

BUXTON, N.C. (WITN) - A seventh home collapsed Wednesday in Buxton fueled by Hurricane Imelda.

The National Park Service says the unoccupied house collapsed at approximately 8 p.m. at 46207 Tower Circle Road.

The tide came in around 3:30 p.m. and repeatedly smacked into two homes still standing at the end of Tower Circle Road.

A news photographer for a Norfolk television station was wiped out by one of those big waves as he was setting up a GoPro camera. He was not injured, but lost the camera to the ocean.

A total of seven homes have been lost since yesterday afternoon’s high tide. Five of those on Tuesday and one overnight.

Dare County said yesterday that three homes on Cottage Avenue in Buxton, and two on Tower Circle Road, had fallen.

Dare County manager Bobby Outten was out among other county commissioners in the debris field observing the wreckage.

“So now we got to start the process of clean up and recovery and the things that we do after we have events like this,” Outten said.

Outten advises all residents and visitors to stay clear of the shoreline and the collapsed home due to the hazardous debris.

No injuries were reported in yesterday’s collapses, and all five homes were unoccupied.

Janie Baldi built her beachfront home in the 1980s and says the shoreline used to be around two football fields away and even witnessed some of the homes fall.

“I was inside and I heard a big thump and I heard wood cracking. I ran out to the deck and I saw the ocean house on the opposite side of the street go down, it just crumbled,” Baldi said. “Within 30 minutes, another one went down, and with another 5 to 10 minutes, our oceanfront on the side of the street succumbed and fell in, so it was traumatizing.”

The woman says she now has two options: either pack up and move, or wait until the shoreline is at her doorstep.

The entire beachfront, from northern Buxton through the northern section of off-road vehicle ramp 43 is closed.

Nineteen beach homes have been lost in the Buxton and Rodanthe areas in the past five years.