ANNA MARIA ISLAND – Hurricane Idalia’s storm surge eroded the Island’s renourished beaches, but the full extent of the damage and when it will be repaired is not yet known.
“It could be months before any decision on what efforts will be undertaken is made,” Manatee County spokesman Bill Logan said in a Sept. 8 email to The Sun.
The first step of the process – evaluation by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) – has been completed.
“Jacksonville District completed preliminary damage assessments of all federal shore protection projects Sept. 1-3,” according to David Ruderman of the USACE Jacksonville Corporate Communications Office.
“Non-federal sponsors of federally authorized and constructed coastal storm risk management projects which sustained damages resulting from Hurricane Idalia have until Oct. 1 to apply for rehabilitation assistance under Public Law 84-99,” Ruderman said in an email to The Sun.
As of Sept. 15, Ruderman said requests have been received from Manatee and Pinellas counties.
During the Aug. 29 hurricane, storm surge reached 3-4 feet in coastal areas in Manatee County.
“This is the beginning of what I am told is a long process whereby the beaches are hand-measured, staked-out and surveyed for damage estimates from the storm and what measures may be needed to renourish any impacted areas,” Logan said in the Sept. 8 email.
Sarasota Bay Estuary Program (SBEP) Director Dr. Dave Tomasko evaluated the impact from Hurricane Idalia on the SBEP website.
“With Idalia, even though it was about 100 miles offshore, we were on its strong side, and thus we got the storm surge, even though we mostly experienced just tropical storm level winds,” he wrote. “This storm surge came a few hours before the peak of the full moon high tides.”
Water levels were retreating as the tide was coming up, Tomasko wrote.
“So, the dreaded ‘high tide on top of a storm surge’ did not happen,” Tomasko wrote. “That is lucky, because that could have added another foot or two. Still, water levels were about 3’ higher than they would have been otherwise.”
The last major beach renourishment locally was the 2021 Coquina Beach Storm Damage Restoration project, which placed approximately 74,805 cubic yards of sand at Coquina Beach.
“Beach renourishment projects not only provide recreational beach width for the benefit of residents and visitors, but during storm events, the sand also provides critical protection for structures and infrastructure landward of the beach. In addition, the beach provides critical habitat and nesting areas for protected species such as sea turtles and shorebirds,” according to Manatee County’s website.
Since 1992, Manatee County has participated in eight beach nourishment projects.
Approximately 6.9 million cubic yards of sand from offshore borrow areas have been placed as a result of the county’s and USACE’s beach preservation efforts.
ANNA MARIA ISLAND – While the Island missed a direct hit from Hurricane Ian, the effects of the Sept. 28 storm included beach erosion, primarily on the north end of the Island.
The good news for Manatee County, however, is that the sands are expected to return over the next several months without county intervention.
“For Anna Maria Island, the majority of beach sands were blown or drawn into a shallow sand bar directly offshore of the beaches along North Shore Drive and are expected to return over the next six to nine months with seasonal onshore winds and wave currents,” according to Charlie Hunsicker, Manatee County National Resources Department director, in an email to The Sun.
Hunsicker said the majority of Gulf-facing beaches along the Island saw little or no effects of erosion at all.
“Manatee County participates in the state’s critically eroded beach program requiring an annual survey of beach conditions to track how the beach is approaching the time when renourishment is needed to continue to provide storm protection,” Hunsicker said. “We have already commissioned this year’s annual survey and will await its findings to determine how far along in years we are to the next erosion event, keeping in mind that a strong hurricane at any time has the potential to quickly remove vast stretches of beach, sacrificing it and the protection it provides to save residential and commercial structures and evacuation roadways upland from the beach.”
In 1992-93, the first beach nourishment of Anna Maria Island was commenced to protect upland infrastructure. Since then, approximately 6.9 million cubic yards of sand from offshore borrow areas have been placed by U.S. Army Corps of Engineers contractors.
Only private property owners who have given permission through a state-approved process that sets a seaward Erosion Control Line (ECL) are eligible for publicly-funded renourishment efforts, Hunsicker said.
“In Manatee County, property owners from approximately 79th Street North in Holmes Beach all the way south to Longboat Pass have given this permission, along with a one-half mile length of beach bordered roughly between Magnolia and Elm streets in the city of Anna Maria. Residents outside these limits in the city of Anna Maria have not given their consent to the establishment of an Erosion Control Line, especially along North Shore Drive, and are not eligible for county, state or federal renourishment programs,” he said.
Updated Oct. 16 – Hurricane Michael’s violent churning in the Gulf of Mexico could break up the red tide bloom that has affected Southwest Florida for the past year – or it could make it worse, scientists say.
The storm made landfall Wednesday, Oct. 10 in the Florida Panhandle, just shy of a Category 5 hurricane. As its tail brushed past Anna Maria Island on Wednesday, it caused minor local flooding, but whipped up Gulf surf, making the red tide airborne.
Short-term red tide outlook
Red tide continues to seriously impact Florida tourism businesses. It reached Anna Maria Island on Aug. 3, but coastal Gulf communities to the south began experiencing red tide a year ago this month, and the bloom now covers 150 miles of coastline.
While not unprecedented in its duration, this bloom is unusually persistent, according to NOAA forecasters, who predict that coastal communities are likely to continue to experience the effects of the ongoing bloom.
NOAA forecasts low levels of red tide on Gulf beaches in Manatee County through Oct. 17.
The size of the bloom changes constantly, and is patchy – not every beach is affected every day.
Until Michael passed by, hurricane storm winds were blowing offshore, pushing most of the water containing red tide farther out into the Gulf, said Dr. Richard Pierce, associate vice president for research and a senior scientist at Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota.
However, as the hurricane traveled north past Anna Maria Island, its winds changed direction, bringing the red tide back onshore on west/southwesterly winds, he said.
Scientists are still collecting air and water samples from the storm, so it’s too early to reach any conclusions, nor can researchers tell if past hurricanes helped or hindered past red tides, because there has not been enough continuous monitoring, he said.
“But there have been times when a hurricane came and dispersed red tide so it didn’t come back,” he said, adding that other times, storms concentrated nutrients near the shore, which makes red tide worse.
“We can’t really predict it. Every situation is different,” Pierce said.
Past hurricanes have not caused red tide blooms to dissipate, although the research is incomplete because the number of cases where blooms and hurricanes occurred at the same time is small, said Jerry Slaff, Public Affairs Specialist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), noting, “We will be watching to see what effects Hurricane Michael has on the current bloom.”
Island beaches were sunny but sparsely populated the day after Hurricane Michael. – Cindy Lane | Sun
Scientists agree that hurricanes can move red tide around. The 2005-06 red tide bloom off the coast of southwest Florida was carried up to the Florida Panhandle by Hurricane Katrina, according to NOAA, and the current bloom intensified and spread to the Florida Panhandle after Tropical Storm Gordon in September 2018.
What Michael did to the beach
“(Anna Maria Island) beaches fared very well with this storm overall, especially along the beaches from mid-Island to the north end. The waves certainly overtopped all of the sandy beaches but after the storm passed, wave action had the effect of leveling out the beaches on a gentle slope down to the waterline. Many low-profile dunes were overtopped as well, with a minor loss of sea oats, but overall conditions recovered well. At Coquina Beach on the south end, noticeable erosion occurred, almost to be expected as this stretch is one of our most active erodible beaches on the entire Island. We are working with FEMA and the Army Corps of Engineers to bring back a major beach renourishment project to the Island in the spring of next year to rebalance sand losses encountered with Hurricane Hermine and Irma combined.” – Charlie Hunsicker, Director of the Manatee County Parks and Recreation Department
Red tide worse locally after Michael
As the lifeguards in Bradenton Beach got ready to begin their day Thursday, there was hope that the high winds and surf would disperse the red tide.
But as midday approached on Coquina Beach, those hopes were dashed.
William and Rita Postino of Bradenton were two of the few people on the beach around 9 a.m. on Thursday.
“I collect shells and we come out here two or three times per week,” said Rita Postino. “There are more people here than yesterday watching the waves.”
William and Rita Postino – Tom Vaught | Sun
She said the red tide was not as noticeable as the water rose at high tide and covered a lot of beach.
Thursday there were few dead fish on the beach.
Mark and Kathy Biscontine – Tom Vaught | Sun
At the Coquina Beach Café, Mark and Kathy Biscontine of Bradenton said the water covered the old groins that normally were buried by sand. They said surfers were out and they came close to the groins because they were not visible from the water.
Lifeguard Chelsea Hart guided a utility vehicle down the beach around 10:30 a.m. There were a few more people on the beach, but the irritation and smell of red tide were increasing. She said they use masks when it gets too bad. An Army veteran, she was a lifeguard in Volusia County on Florida’s East Coast before coming to Manatee County to work the beaches five years ago.
Bradenton Beach groins – Tom Vaught | Sun
“The beach has a little deeper slope to it, but I don’t think too much sand washed away yesterday,” she said. “There were some pretty intense waves yesterday.”
Hart said conditions were a “double red” Wednesday, meaning nobody was allowed in the water.
Chelsea Hart – Tom Vaught | Sun
For the people who are on the beach to save lives, the red tide outbreak has been especially rough.
Red tide: What scientists know
Florida red tide (Karenia brevis), a type of harmful algal bloom, is the result of uncontrolled algae growth in optimal conditions, including salinity, sunlight and nutrients such as nitrogen and iron, the latter carried on winds from the Sahara desert across the ocean and deposited in the Gulf.
Blooms produce neurotoxins called “brevetoxins” in the water, turning the Gulf’s light greenish-blue water to dark reddish-brown, killing fish, manatees, dolphins, sea turtles, and even a whale shark earlier this year.
The darker water reduces the amount of sunlight that passes through it, affecting organisms on the sea floor that need sunlight to live, according to research at the University of South Florida College of Marine Science in St. Petersburg. The algae also can deplete oxygen in the water.
Red tide toxins in the water can become airborne with wind and wave action, causing respiratory problems, especially for people with asthma, emphysema, COPD or other chronic respiratory diseases. Red tide toxins affect the nervous system, and when inhaled, they cause respiratory irritation including coughing, sneezing and a scratchy throat, and can trigger asthma attacks.
Red tide toxins also can accumulate in oysters and clams, which can lead to neurotoxic shellfish poisoning in people who consume contaminated shellfish.
Seafoam during a red tide is highly concentrated in toxins and should not be touched.
A team studied Anna Maria Island from stem to stern today, agreeing that Hurricane Irma took a bite out of the beach.
The storm, which was a strong Category 2 when it passed over Manatee County, caused “deflation and retreat” on the beach, which means the beach lost some of its depth and width, said Charlie Hunsicker, the director of the Manatee County Parks and Natural Resources department.
Charlie Hunsicker, director of the Manatee County Parks and Natural Resources Department, looks at a newly-exposed erosion control groin that was completely covered by sand at Cortez Beach before Hurricane Irma hit, while U.S. Army Corps of Engineers workers document changes in the beach. – Cindy Lane | Sun
“There has been some loss,” agreed Larry George, an environmental consultant with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, part of the team that scoured the beach today under the blazing sun.
The beach already was eroded from Hurricane Hermine earlier this month when Irma struck, said Michelle Pfeiffer, of APTIM, Manatee County’s beach consultant.
Gabriel Todaro, of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, measures the beach from the dunes seaward with the help of an assistant. – Cindy Lane | Sun
Gabriel Todaro, of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, took measurements on the beach to compare later with previous mapping information to determine the extent of the erosion.
One clue is the sudden appearance of the tops of 1960s-era erosion control groins that lie perpendicular to the beach and have not been seen in decades. The red “Keep Off” lettering looks freshly painted, as if the team were excavating Egyptian ruins, Hunsicker said.
At Coquina Beach, the storm apparently pulled the sand toward the Gulf, flattening it as it went, and leaving a shallow channel where backwash flowed. Hunsicker said the waves eventually will wash the sand back up higher onto the beach.
Seaweed washed up by Hurricane Irma covers Coquina Beach, which remains closed this weekend due to downed trees in the parking lot. – Cindy Lane | Sun
Numerous patches of seaweed on the beach were carried all the way to the dunes by high tides in some areas. Seaweed, known as “wrack,” normally is limited to the shoreline on AMI.
The wrack contains food for shorebirds, which often rest in them, so the county will not rake up the seaweed from Longboat Pass to the first lifeguard stand on Coquina Beach, which is a no swimming area, or from a bird nesting area in Holmes Beach, or from Bean Point in Anna Maria, he said, adding that the county will clean up the seaweed from high-use beaches on the Island including Coquina, Cortez and Manatee.
Manatee County’s beach renourishment program, dating back to the early 1990s, prevented Irma from pushing the Gulf of Mexico over Gulf Drive at Coquina Beach, the Island’s narrowest point and a state-designated critically eroded beach, Hunsicker said.
Coquina and Cortez beaches have long been a priority for county renourishment efforts, with the recent reconstruction of three erosion control groins known as “Twin Piers,” named when the first two were built, he said.
That stretch of beach between Longboat Pass north to Cortez Beach gets no federal funding because no structures are on the beach other than lifeguard stands, Hunsicker said, adding that the county plans to ask the state for financial help to repair all or some of the damage.
