The legacy and lessons of Dorian, 1 year later

One year later, the impact of post-tropical storm Dorian is still visible in some parts of Prince Edward Island, even as the lessons learned from the natural disaster are being applied to future emergencies.

The Insurance Bureau of Canada estimated the insured damage to P.E.I. from the storm was $17.5 million, and more than $100 million across Atlantic Canada, not including damage to government-owned infrastructure.

"I think the biggest lesson for us is that we've never experienced a storm like Dorian in P.E.I.," said Tanya Mullally, P.E.I.'s emergency management co-ordinator. 

"We had Juan, but it only really impacted Charlottetown significantly, so to see that tip-to-tip experience and impact was significant for us."

The Emergency Measures Organization was activated four days prior to Dorian.

"When we know that there is a hurricane that's going to impact Atlantic Canada, the Canadian Hurricane Centre provides briefings to the emergency measures organizations within Atlantic Canada," Mullally said. 

"So for three or four days prior to, we were getting a briefing every day and that confidence level was coming up higher and higher with each of those briefings saying we are going to see a direct landfall to this storm."

Winds over 90 kilometres per hour

Harsh winds and heavy rain bashed P.E.I. overnight Saturday into Sunday morning, with 90 millimetres of rainfall in Summerside and 50 millimetres in Charlottetown as well as high winds.

"What was really impressive was, across the Island, winds were in excess of 90 km/h," said CBC meteorologist Tina Simpkin.

"The highest one that I saw was at North Cape at 122 km/h."

By daylight on Sunday morning, Islanders started to share dramatic photos of the damage. 

Provincial EMO officials said nearly 75 per cent of the province was without power and some communication infrastructure such as landlines and cellphones were down.

"One of the interesting things about hurricanes, we typically wouldn't see that breadth of damage from tip to tip and we've seen significant damage from east to west," Mullally said. 

"That's not typical, but it was the size of the storm was so enormous, how it was distributed across the province. But it did take days for us to really get a full picture of that."

Dramatic rescue

One of the areas hardest hit was the Crystal Beach Campground, on P.E.I.'s North Shore.

First responders pulled 31 people and five dogs from trailers rapidly filling with water early Sunday morning after a storm surge flooded the trailers.

One year after Dorian, the memories are still strong for campground owner Matthew Wedge.

"It was horrible, something that I never dreamt it would ever look like," said Wedge, who has owned the campground for more than 20 years.

"Just more destruction than I ever, ever would have imagined. The water probably covered 70 percent of the campground."

Debris from the storm was strewn over the area.

"Some actually floated across a little river that's close to the campground and probably a half a kilometre away into a farmer's field," Wedge said.

"Pieces of trailers, decks, seaweed everywhere. We trucked about 66 tandem loads of seaweed off this property."

Lessons learned

Wedge said there are lessons to be learned from Dorian. 

"We've learned that there needs to be a better evacuation policy in place, not just here, but for other businesses that are close to a shoreline," Wedge said.

"We're hoping to be able to work more closely with the government in the future when something like this happens."

Wedge said Dorian also taught him the unpredictability of a severe weather event.

"With any storm, I do follow them and it even fooled me," Wedge said.

"It regained some strength in the last hour or two, when it got closer to the Island. So I think it was one of those storms that just surprised a lot of people."

Disaster relief

Wedge estimates the damage to the campground to be around $100,000, some of which was covered by insurance, and he has also applied for disaster relief funding from the Red Cross. 

According to EMO, a total of 128 applications to the program were received, with $1.5 million paid out to date and an additional $1.1 million approved for applicants who still have to submit final claim documents.

Wedge said the damage to the trailers on the property was between $500,000 and $600,000.

To Wedge's surprise, many campers are back at Crystal Beach Campground, despite Dorian.

"When it first happened, I was concerned that I would lose business and it would scare people away," Wedge said. 

"But I think everyone kind of thought the same way I did, that it was hopefully a once in a lifetime storm for us."

'I was awestruck'

Another area hit hard by post-tropical storm Dorian was the Cavendish Campground in the P.E.I. National Park, which lost 80 per cent of its trees. 

"After the hurricane subsided and we got a chance to come in to the campground, I was awestruck at the extent of devastation," said Bill Courtney, asset manager for Parks Canada in P.E.I. National Park.

"The trees were piled on top of each other. You couldn't drive on the campground roads. It just wasn't passable." 

There were no campers on-site at the time Dorian struck as Parks Canada had evacuated them the day before.

"It was beyond belief how much damage happened inside the campground," Courtney said. 

"But thankfully, there were no staff, no visitors in the campground during the hurricane." 

One year later, there are still downed trees everywhere.

The 200 campsites at the Cavendish Campground remained close in 2020, and Courtney said the work to restore the site will continue until December 2021.

There will be trees planted at the campground this fall, but Courtney said they will be better suited for the climate on P.E.I.'s North Shore. 

"We learn from every natural disaster, of course, so things are going to be done differently here," Courtney said.

"We lost a lot of our trees so we're going to be planting, not spruce trees, but Acadian forest species this time. These are native to the Island and will be more wind tolerant as they grow."

Natural process

Courtney said the national park also had significant coastal erosion from post-tropical storm Dorian, losing between two and four metres of coastline in certain areas.

"We've been asked the question, are you going to repair that? In this case, no, erosion is part of natural process and the dunes do have a method of restoring themselves." 

Courtney said some of the fallen trees will remain, to serve as habitat for animals and provide nutrients as they rot.

He said there will also be interpretive signs put up near some of the destroyed areas, to explain about post-tropical storm Dorian and the damage that it did in September 2019. 

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