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American Lighthouse Foundation, Inc.
P.O. Box 565
Rockland,
Maine 04841
Phone: 207-594-4174
info@lighthousefoundation.org
The American Lighthouse Foundation is a
Non-Profit 501(c)(3) Organization dedicated to the preservation of America's historic lighthouses.
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October Northeaster Stirs the Imagination at
Race Point Lighthouse
By Bob Trapani, Jr.
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| Staying overnight at a lighthouse is an
experience many of us view as the ultimate when it comes to appreciating
our lighthouse heritage up close and personal. The ability to leisurely
retrace the steps of bygone keepers and allow our imaginations to run
wild, romanticizing, what it might have been like to |
Photo by Bob Trapani, Jr.
Race Point Lighthouse
Cape Cod, MA
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live at a
lighthouse a century ago is simply too alluring to pass up. Unlike most
others though, staying at a lighthouse during a storm rather than a calm,
star-lit night is an experience I have always kept on my personal “wish”
list.
When I scheduled an overnight stay at Race Point Lighthouse on Cape Cod last
month to meet and talk with members of the American Lighthouse Foundation’s
Cape Cod Chapter about their project, I naturally had no idea at the time
what kind of weather we would encounter. As the day drew closer to travel
down to Cape Cod from my home in Maine, I realized my good fortune in that
the visit would coincide with the season’s first northeaster – one
AccuWeather.com was referring to as a potential “Super Storm.” My personal
“wish” list was now about to have one more item come true.
Given the fact that the 2005 hurricane season has been both extremely active
and destructive along the U.S. mainland, it came as no surprise |
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Photo by Bob Trapani, Jr.
Cape Cod Bay was glass-like the night
before the storm
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to me that one of “Old Man Winter’s” dreaded northeasters
would pay an early visit to the Atlantic seaboard. So on October 24,
2005 -- the day before the arrival of the developing northeaster, a
sense of anxiety ran high along coastal regions stretching from Maine to
Delaware. Many regions had already |
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experienced far
too much rain this year, causing widespread flooding, not to mention the
ever-present concerns of coastal erosion stemming from the northeaster’s
ravaging surf.
Meteorologist Alan Durham with the National Weather Service in Taunton,
Massachusetts, described the approaching storm, saying, “The nor’easter is
picking up some moisture from Hurricane Wilma, which is passing well
southeast of the region, but is going to be a good storm in its own right.”
The National Weather Service’s marine forecast was no less ominous. On
October 25th as the storm was building in intensity, the agency
released the following statement for the coastal waters from Provincetown,
to Chatham to Nantucket, Massachusetts, that warned of, “NE winds 35 to 45
knots with gusts up to 65 knots...seas 22 to 28 feet...rain.”
Though such a foreboding weather forecast was not good for the Atlantic
coast, it only served to heighten the personal drama for the overnight stay
with my family and members of the Cape Cod Chapter at Race Point Light. In
the end, the northeaster’s fury did not quite match the meteorological hype,
but the storm was able to conjure up many personal images that ranged from
the old lightkeeper’s vigilance during such harrowing storms to many ghostly
ships that met their fate along the shifting sands of Cape Cod.
The evening of the 24th was the typical calm before the storm.
Cape Cod Bay was glass-like, with the only hint of deteriorating weather |
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being the dark, threatening clouds looming on the
horizon. One by one, the surf fishermen were departing the beach along
the lighthouse at the request of the park ranger; their four-wheel drive
vehicles seen bouncing along the ruts in the sand dunes before their
headlights vanished completely into the |
Photo by Bob Trapani, Jr.
A lone "shipwrecked" timber lies on the
beach as storm clouds gather on the
horizon
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night. The sense
of isolation was now riveting. As I walked along the lonely sands of Race
Point at dusk, the dramatic writings by renowned author Edward Rowe Snow
appropriately came to mind.
Contemplating the potential power of the northeaster lurking off the coast,
I recalled the words of a Race Point keeper that Snow captured in his book,
The Lighthouses of New England. Lightkeeper James Hinckley once said,
“The wind often touches a mile a minute. Some of the gusts will throw you
several feet, and it’s hard going. The sand is bad enough, cutting into your
skin, but a combination of sand and snow is almost unbearable.” Though we
would experience no wintry snow during this storm, Hinckley’s words would
prove true in relation to the power of the wind and its ability to reign
supreme over the exposed dunes during an event like a northeaster.
Trudging further along the soft sand, my eyes caught sight of two large
wooden beams with spikes in them. The splintered remnants could have been
from a bygone pier ripped to pieces by a past storm and later beached at
Race Point on the tides, or they may even have been |
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Photo by Bob Trapani, Jr.
Race Point's light shines forth on the
evening of October 24, 2005
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timbers from a ship that met its fate on
the Cape long ago. I honestly could not tell, but it was more thought
provoking on the eve of a storm to believe that these timbers were the
ghostly remains of a shipwreck. As Edward Rowe Snow himself said, “More
than one hundred vessels have been wrecked here |
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(Race Point) since
the early records of Provincetown began.” With that thought entrenched in my
mind, I reached down to run my fingers across the faded timbers before
moving on.
As the final traces of daylight were fading from the evening sky, I decided
it was best to return to the warm confines of the keeper’s house and let
everyone know I didn’t “get lost.” Finding my way back was no problem, for
by this time Race Point’s bright light was shining high above the dunes. As
I walked inside the house, I realized that I was just in the knick of time
for a wonderful supper being served up by Sylvia Walker and Mary Fiske.
As everyone enjoyed dinner, conversation naturally gravitated to the
potential impact of the northeaster. We all knew that the storm surge would
not impact the light station, but its effect on the two-mile sandy road
leading over the dunes was less than certain. As for the keeper’s dwelling
and its ability to cope with the storm winds to come, we were “good to go.”
According to Cape Cod Chapter president Jim Walker, the walls of the
structure were reinforced “with bricks between the studs of the frame.” Jim
went on to say that, “You probably wouldn’t even hear the wind if it were
not for the windows rattling.” |
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| After supper, Bill Fiske, vice-chair for
the Cape Cod Chapter, Jim Walker and I spent the remainder of the
evening talking about all of the wonderful work performed by their
group’s dedicated volunteers. We also reviewed plans for upcoming
projects in 2006 that will further improve the preservation and use of
the light station. By |
Photo by Ann-Marie Trapani
Nina Trapani (foreground) and
Sylvia Walker wash-up the dishes
following supper
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10:00 p.m., we were all ready to
call it a night and see what morning would bring in terms of storm
conditions. As my wife Ann tucked our children – Nina, Katrina and Dominic
into bed, Edward Rowe Snow’s many historical accounts and the present
unknown associated with the lurking tempest filled my racing thoughts before
drifting off to sleep.
Sometime during the early morning hours of the 25th, the storm
began to lash out against the coast of the Cape. The powerful winds spawned
by the northeaster awoke me from my sleep around 3:00 a.m. The storm gusts
sounded like a blanket of rolling thunder being shaken across the darkened
sky – at times vibrating the sturdy keeper’s house and all its windows to
the core. As I sat up in bed I tried to imagine what it might have been like
to have been a surfmen for the United States Life-Saving Service back in the
late 1800s, walking along the beach in such conditions, with only a lantern
to guide his way. During his patrol, the lifesaver would have kept a keen
eye out over pitch-black seascape, trying to espy a ship’s light indicating
the vessel may be wandering precariously too close to the cape.
I also remembered a stirring 1802 quote by James Freeman that was captured
in the book, Historic Cape Cod Lighthouses: Race Point, by
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Photo by Bob Trapani, Jr.
The light station at Race Point braces
for another storm in its long & storied history
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James W. Claflin. “A north east storm, the most violent,
and fatal to seamen, as it is frequently accompanied with snow, blows
directly on land: a strong current sets along the shore: add to which
that ships, during the operation of such a storm, endeavor to work to
the northward, that they may get into the bay. Should they be
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unable to weather
Race Point, the wind drives them on the shore, and shipwreck in inevitable.
Accordingly, the strand is every where covered with the fragments of
vessels.” Though wooden ships driven ashore by such storms are now a distant
memory, the sound of the howling wind served as a reminder to a time when
the lifesavers represented the only hope for many shipwrecked sailors taking
part in a terrifying struggle between life and death just outside the light
station’s door.
By 6:00 a.m., I decided to leave my cozy bed to check the weather
instruments that are maintained in the hallway on the first floor of the
former keeper’s house. The gauges confirmed why the winds interrupted my
sleep, showing northeast winds blowing at a sustained speed of 40 to 45
knots, with gusts to 60 knots. Morning light also revealed rain being driven
sideways by the harrowing winds, as well as beach grass and hardy brush
scattered along the dunes shuttering feverishly in the face of the northeast
gale.
Cape Cod Chapter president Jim Walker and wife Sylvia were up early
preparing eggs and bacon for everyone, and at the same time, making
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plans to pack
up and leave the light station before the storm conditions worsened
right after breakfast. The original thought was to leave at low tide
after 10:00 a.m., but prudent judgment prompted everyone to embark for
“solid ground” an hour and a half earlier. Everyone breathed a sigh of
relief on our 2-mile return trip over the dunes when it was realized
that the northeaster had yet to make the dune crossing impassable due to
storm surge – a condition that is quite common during heavy storms.
According to
the Boston Globe the following day, “Though the northeaster fed
on energy from Wilma, it failed to merge with the |
Photo by Bob Trapani, Jr.
Jim Walker busies himself
cooking eggs and bacon for breakfast as
the storm rages
on outside
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hurricane, decreasing its
wallop.” The newspaper reported, “Rainfall in New England range from 1 to 3
inches, with winds of 45 to 55 miles per hour.” The best of all worlds
transpired during this particular northeaster in that the region was spared
of any extensive damage, everyone staying at the lighthouse made it home
safe and sound – and I personally had the good fortune of experiencing a
fleeting glimpse of bygone lighthouse life when keeper’s and their families
worked to keep the lights shining under storm conditions. |
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Photo by Bob Trapani, Jr.
The northeaster pounds the Cape
at Race Point on the morning of
October 25, 2005
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