Oregon Inlet, in the middle of the Outer Banks of North Carolina, is a busy place; it’s a major thoroughfare for a large sportfishing fleet heading for the Gulf Stream, only 30 nm offshore, and it’s one of the few inlets along that part of the coastline. It also is home to the Oregon Inlet Bar only five feet underwater near the inlet’s entrance, where water from Pamlico Sound meets the Atlantic Ocean, resulting in a collision that can produce 14-foot waves. Hit by drifting sand and tides, the inlet also moves south about 66 feet a year, so that local knowledge is both necessary, and often outdated. As a result, the Coast Guard station there is busy, very busy, both monitoring the status of the ever-shifting bar and rescuing mariners who get stranded there.
Here’s a great story from InTheBight, whose reporter spent a day with the Coast Guard there, including rescuing a 60-foot sportfish whose engines had died near the bar; they towed it to safety. The Coast Guard spends a lot of time towing disabled vessels that run afoul of the bar, but it can’t get them all. See the picture above of another sportfishing boat that capsized crossing the bar last September, throwing all five people on board into the water. The Coast Guard did rescue the people; the boat washed up on shore.
Oregon Inlet can be a treacherous place. “We see lots of capsizing, grounding and damage on the bar,” Senior Chief Petty Officer Mark Dilenge told InTheBite. “Even on a flat day, the amount of ocean water that flows in and out creates huge tidal effects, which can be super dangerous.” Read more:
https://www.inthebite.com/2018/03/beware-oregon-inlet-bar/
