From the archives: Residents cope in wake of wintery blast

This story was originally published in Newsday on February 7, 1998.

Denis and Carol Kelleher stood on a wooden deck on the ground behind their Southampton home Friday. The deck and their swimming pool was all that remained of their $750,000 home, which had fallen into the surf early Friday and was being pounded into rubble by the ocean.

Wave after ocean wave broke over their house, crashing and smashing the wood and shingles and plaster board.

Denis Kelleher grew up poor in County Kerry, Ireland, before he started a financial services business. "This was all part of the American dream for me," he said. "You build things for your family, and to see it all washed away is heartbreaking."

The dream started coming to an end Thursday, when a powerful nor'easter pushed the ocean behind the bulkhead by the Kellehers' summer home at the end of Potato Road. By early Friday morning, the house had broken in half and was in the sea.

"It's still sinking in," said Carol Kelleher. Her husband estimated their loss at $750,000, with only a third of that covered by federal emergency funds.

It was the only house to be lost to this week's powerful coastal storm. Scattered along Suffolk's South Shore, however, there were signs that showed just how bad things might have been had the brunt of the storm come a little closer.

--A state of emergency was declared Friday in Ocean Beach, and half the community was under 2 feet of water, Mayor Paul Pugliese said.

--A mile east of Smith Point Park in Mastic Beach, the ocean washed over the sand dunes and scraped a 1,000-foot-wide area clean of all vegetation. State Department of Environmental Conservation officials say more washovers can be expected there.

--Seven separate areas on Fire Island also saw washovers, although there was little erosion to go with them. The worst damage was in Southampton Town, where the Kelleher family lost their home and a half-dozen more remain precariously close to the edge of the ocean. Town Supervisor Vincent Cannuscio also declared a state of emergency.

Gary Ireland, who owns a house next door to the Kellehers' and who lost his porch to the sea this week, said, "Our family's been here for 70 years, and this is the worst I've seen."

Cannuscio said another oceanfront homeowner, William Rudin - whose house at Mecox has a foundation that is being undermined by the sea - has already told him that he will abandon his beachfront house because of the continuing erosion.

Assemb. Fred W. Thiele (R-Sag Harbor), a former Southampton town supervisor, predicted that more storm damage would be seen before winter ends. "It's the harbinger of more," he said. "We're just barely into February, and historically some of our worst storms have been in March. We have an extremely vunerable coastline."

STAFF WRITERS Christina Wojdylo and Joe Haberstroh contributed to this story.