Hurricane Dennis (1999)

Dennis never came ashore in the US as a hurricane. After moving through the Bahamas, it passed about 60 miles off the North Carolina coast on August 30, 1999, as a Category 2 hurricane, then drifted offshore for days.¹ It made landfall on the Cape Lookout National Seashore just east of Harkers Island, North Carolina, at 2100 UTC (5 p.m. EDT) on September 4 as a tropical storm with 60-knot (69 mph) winds and a 984 mb pressure.¹

On the August 30 pass, gusts reached 96 knots (110 mph) at Wrightsville Beach and 85 knots (98 mph) at Hatteras Village.¹ Tides ran 8 to 10 feet above normal along the Neuse River, flooding numerous homes around Harlowe, Adams Creek and Club Foot Creek, and 6 feet of water was reported near the Trent River in New Bern.² On the Outer Banks, the dunes on Hatteras Island were breached in many places and six homes in Rodanthe were lost.³ With the September 4 landfall, storm tides ran about 6 to 8 feet above normal on the Neuse and Pamlico rivers. Beaufort and Craven county officials said several homes flooded for the first time, and Pamlico County called it its worst flooding in more than 65 years.⁴ Ocracoke reported 19.13 inches of rain from Dennis, the highest total.¹

An F2 tornado on September 4 hit a three-block area of Hampton, Virginia. Three apartment complexes and an assisted living facility were condemned, two more apartment complexes were partly condemned, and roofs were lifted off many buildings.⁵ NHC put the tornado's damage at $7 million with 15 injuries, estimated total US damage from Dennis at $157 million, and reported four deaths in Florida from high surf.¹