Army Corps To Let Nature Address Inlet Jetty Beach

OCEAN CITY -- A rarely-seen “anomaly” in the Ocean City Inlet reappeared this week in the form of a wide, sandy beach on the south side of the north jetty in an area typically under water and pounded by waves.

In the wake of Hurricane Sandy, which plowed through the resort in late October and other coastal storms, nearly all of the beaches in the area were altered to varying degrees with sand eroded from some areas and deposited in others. Perhaps the most startling change in the days after Sandy passed through the area was a sandy spit of new beach as wide as 25 feet at different times depending on the tide on the south side of the rocky north jetty, which, along with the south jetty on the opposite side, provide the manmade bookends for the Inlet created eight decades ago.

City officials and long-time locals said after the storm they had never seen a sandy beach form on the south side of the jetty and surveys were performed to determine the extent of the silting in of the Inlet. The sandy beach on the south side of the Inlet eventually disappeared again, likely corrected by natural processes, but it reappeared again this week. On Tuesday, the beach formed on the Inlet side of the jetty wide enough to set up an umbrella and chair or to walk a dog on. At least one surfer even rode a wave in the Inlet that was breaking on the beach on Tuesday.
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