Hurricane Sandy Devastates Old Lyme's Beach Community

Hurricane Sandy's most dangerous storm surge was pushed ashore by 90 mph winds in the dark of night on October 29. Most residents in Old Lyme's beach communities did their best to secure their property and evacuated as ordered, returning yesterday morning to survey the damage in the cold light of day.

But not everyone opted to leave. Chris Garvin, 32, his brother and father decided they would ride out the storm at home at Hawks Nest Beach.

"We just didn't think it was going to be too bad," said Garvin.  

The level four flood the storm surge created was, if anything, worse than anyone had predicted. Even so, at the height of the storm, when the water was thigh high, Garvin and his family decided to take a walk along the beach.

"We watched the chimney fall off a house and the house fell in the water," Garvin said. "I will never forget that experience."

Truth be told, he's lucky he's still around to recount the tale. Both his house and his father's house at Hawks Nest Beach survived, wet but intact. Their neighbors' properties on West End Drive, a narrow spit of land bordered by Long Island Sound to the East and a marsh to the West, didn't fare so well.

Many of these homes have served as family summer cottages for generations. Some even withstood the power of the 1938 hurricane but, after so many years, a number of houses met their match with Sandy. 

The powerful storm surge pushed at least two houses into the water and many more were knocked off their foundations. Sandy peeled away siding, ripped away decks, relocated garages, and carried yard furniture across the road and deep into the marsh.   

When . 

"We're still standing," she said. "It's dry inside. That's all I care about. But there's so much mud, so much debris and our good friend lost his house. There's just no words for that. I'm so disoriented. Everything is so different. The damage is just incredible. The bottom of our garage is flooded and everything stored behind the garage is now on the other side of the marsh. We'll have to get the kayak to haul it back. But we're lucky, God blessed us."

Not far away on Avenue A, roads and houses were deluged with flood water. "We had about 10 inches inside our house," said Sue Tufveson. "The water pushed up the living room floorboards and there's seaweed in the house. We moved a lot of furniture upstairs and put the couch on top of the dining room table but our front porch is completely missing and the back deck is tilted. We think we can salvage that."  

Farther down by Sound View Beach, houses on Hartford Avenue filled with water and roads remain submerged. Jack Vecchitto's family have been coming to the summer cottage they own at 80 Hartford Avenue since 1946. Hurricane Carol was the worst storm to hit it to date, and that was in 1956. The family raised the house after that but Hurricane Sandy's water levels were just shy of the marks Jack's father made to note the high water mark in 1956.

"We didn't know it was going to be this bad," said Vecchitto.