beaches

View from the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse looking north and showing Navy facilities.

Navy base’s wretched reminders include more than petroleum in soils

BY: - November 2, 2023

BUXTON — Petroleum spilled and partially cleaned up at a long-abandoned U.S. Navy base at Cape Hatteras recently reemerged in clumps of peat soil after a storm. Last month, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers stepped up to take responsibility for the cleanup, even though its source is technically uncertain. But the diesel smell and […]

COMMENTARY

The best editorial of the weekend

BY: - September 6, 2016

Yesterday’s lead editorial on WRAL.com gets it right when it comes to the vital importance of keeping North Carolina’s beaches completely and permanently public in light of a state Supreme Court case delving into the matter. Here’s the excellent conclusion: Support for assuring North Carolina’s beaches remain public has brought together about as diverse coalition […]

COMMENTARY

Must read: The utter folly of sandbagging the NC coast

BY: - October 5, 2015

If you had any doubts about the futility and long-term destructiveness of propping up well-heeled property owners along the North Carolina coast with sandbags and so-called “terminal groins” of the kind favored by the well-heeled property owners who run the North Carolina General Assembly and the McCrory administration, read this excellent essay in today’s edition […]

COMMENTARY

Yet another editorial blasts scheme to allow more hardened beach structures

BY: - September 10, 2015

With news reports indicating that lawmakers have reached a backroom deal to expand the number of so-called “terminal groins” allowed along the North Carolina coast, the frequently conservative editorial page of the Jacksonville Daily News has reprinted an editorial this morning from the Wilmington Star News that does a great job of shredding the whole idea. […]

COMMENTARY

The real threat to NC beaches is not sharks

BY: - July 6, 2015

In the aftermath of the troubling shark attacks that have plagued North Carolina beaches this summer, there’s been a natural tendency to worry about the economic impact — both short and long-term — on the beach tourism economy. Bloody, weekly attacks by wild animals are not exactly what you call good publicity. As Ned Barnett […]