Dorian is gone, and we feel fortunate.
Outside some downed trees, scattered leaves, dark homes and obstructed roadways, the damage was next to nil.
With the kind of hype that rightfully comes with a deadly Category 4 hurricane that wreaks havoc on its path to North Carolina, people here — residents, emergency officials, first responders and city, county and town leaders and employees, as well as power crews — were calm but deliberate in their preparations.
And the result was a smooth storm event.
Sure, we got a hand from Mother Nature, as that Category 4 quickly weakened to a Category 2 and made landfall over Cape Hatteras Friday morning as Category 1 storm, but everyone around here was prepared for the worst. They coordinated efforts, disseminated information and teamed to ensure that everyone was as informed and as safe as possible.
That meant declaring states of emergency in towns and unincorporated areas, and enacting curfews for when the worst of Dorian was expected to hit late Thursday and early Friday. These may seem like small things, but they don’t happen on their own. A protocol must be in place, and we applaud local leaders for going through that process well ahead of hurricane season so that the switch can be flipped much easier to ensure all of us are as safe as possible.
As we said in this space earlier this week, there were lessons learned from Hurricane Matthew in 2016 and that education was honed and those skills of disaster preparedness, response and recovery refined during last year’s Hurricane Florence. It is obvious that the framework will serve us well going forward, no matter what the elements coming off the Atlantic bring.
The impact of Dorian, while limited in terms of damage, still meant a massive amount of rainfall in the central part of Sampson County — between 6-7 inches in the central and eastern parts of the county — and thankfully lower amounts in the communities in southern Sampson that were underwater just a year ago.
By Friday, the U.S. National Weather Service tallied 24-hour rainfall amounts in Clinton and Roseboro at 6.9 inches and 6.6 inches, respectively, and maximum wind gusts nearing 50 mph in portions of Sampson. The county was under nearly every time of warning or watch, be it tropical storm, flash flood or tornado.
With all that said, there were no tornadoes spotted and just one water rescue had to be conducted.
The Clinton Fire Department and the N.C. National Guard rescued four adults from a home on Henry Lee Lane with the assistance of a high clearance vehicle, due to rising waters. That was the lone call for rescue, and nobody was injured.
We offer our gratitude to all of those agencies who offered their assistance, whether actively tending to road issues, downed trees and power lines, or monitoring the storm and ensuring residents knew what was going on and hundreds of evacuees had a place they could take refuge.
We thank local law enforcement, Emergency Management officials, rescue personnel, fire departments, the N.C. National Guard, N.C. Forestry, the N.C. Department of Transportation and the many others who were on call during the storm event in Sampson.
We are lucky to have them, rain or shine, regardless of the natural disaster. We are also thankful. This was a far cry from what we’ve seen before, and light years from the utter destruction and devastation in the Bahamas, where the death toll will continue to rise amid the flattened towns and communities that have been wiped off the map.
We are thinking of those who weren’t as fortunate during Dorian. We hope the weeks, months and years ahead offer the kind of recovery they so direly need.