GEOLOGIC AND ANTHROPOMORPHIC CONTRIBUTING FACTORS OF DAMAGE TO THE MUNICIPALITIES OF MANTOLOKING AND ORTLEY BEACH, NJ FROM SUPERSTORM SANDY

The two most damaged municipalities along the northern barrier beach in northern Ocean County were assessed to determine what factors led to the extraordinary level of destruction from SuperStorm Sandy on October 29, 2012. Mantoloking is the first municipality on the barrier beach south of the mostly headland community of Bay Head. Mantoloking, a wealthy town with many old, stately mansions lining the oceanfront within the dunes, is 3.7 km long and 0.4 km wide, and has narrow beaches backed by 3+ m high dunes. Ortley Beach, in contrast, is a 1.3 km by 1.3 km section of Toms River Township farther south along the barrier beach, mostly built on the flat, flood tidal delta islands of the now closed Cranberry Inlet. In general it has wider beaches but has within it some of the myriad of semi-autonomous homeowner’s associations (HAs) that can set many of their own beach and dune maintenance regulations. This led to lower and uneven dune building. The housing stock here is mainly post-World War II beach bungalows on grade on small lots, interspersed with more recent houses built to FEMA pre-Sandy standards with some elevation off grade.

Neither community expected the extensive damage they incurred from both the ocean side with northeast quadrant surge and winds, and the bay side from the surge up Barnegat Bay. At least 50 of the large mansions along the oceanfront of Mantoloking were destroyed by the complete breach of the barrier beach at the Cedar Bridge Ave. bridge and the almost complete destruction of what they thought were adequately protective dunes. The surge coming up Barnegat Bay combined with the elevated water levels due to the oceanfront breach flooded the rest of the municipality from the bay side floating some bayfront homes off their foundations and into the Bay. Every house in Mantoloking Borough, 551, sustained some damage or was destroyed (95). Ortley Beach sustained damage from flooding due to the five foot surge of water from the Bay that easily reached eastward almost to the ocean. However, due to uneven dune building from the HAs and the Township itself, the ocean surged into many blocks of the oceanside houses picking up bungalows and shoving them landward into almost an imbricate pattern.