By Peter Ralston

Dear Friends,

Last Sunday we got about four inches of snow and, as promised, here are two images from that event…it was a lovely, wild and windy day.

But on Wednesday we had a serious SE blow that gusted to near 70 here. That wind, combined with high tide shortly before 10AM created a lot of damage along the coast, hitting some of the lower lying harbors hard indeed. More than a few buildings floated away and were beaten to death on the shorelines. Rockport is a relatively elevated harbor but SE is the one wind direction that really can do a number on us here. We were relatively lucky.

Then on Saturday (yesterday) we got hit again. The winds were not as bad with this second storm but there was an astronomical high tide–11 inches over normal–just after noon. I have not yet heard reports from along the coast and islands, but again in Rockport we were pretty much unscathed. Here’s what Indian Island (at the mouth of our harbor) looked like at about high water, which is what I have titled this one.

High Water

I won’t presently get into the subject at any length, but sea level rise is going to ineluctably make scenes like this more common. It is a reality that is sadly driven home by these back-to-back storms. My heart goes out to the many who sustained damage and loss this week.

All best from here,

Peter