CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Cleanup continued Monday on North Beach, one of Corpus Christi's hardest hit areas from last week's Tropical Storm Alberto. For the first time since the storm, the USS Lexington Museum was able to join other attractions and restaurants in opening their doors back up to the public!
First it was the flooding, and then it was the sand, city crews spent hours Monday digging streets out from under the sand that washed up onto North Beach. The sand was three feet deep in some spots. This, as both the city and county leaders begin to evaluate the damage left behind.
Tropical Storm Alberto left much of North Beach under water including Beach Avenue. By Monday, the street was continuing to dry out.
Street sweepers were out on North Bach making the rounds to clear roadways of any debris.
At the USS Lexington Museum, visitors returned for the first time in a week.
"We are so excited to be back open to the public for our guest aboard," Marketing Director Samantha Koepp-Stemplinger said.
The storm caused the ship to close for five days which resulted in financial hit.
"It was a significant impact to be closed the five days," Koepp-Stemplinger said. "June is our second busiest month for the year, on average for those five days we would see 7,500 guests."
That's easily over a $100,000 dollar impact in just ticket sales.
Crew members feverously worked through the weekend to dig out a path to the famed attraction where the street and plaza were buried in sand that had washed up with the tide.
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"There was a large amount of sand that accumulated in the plaza, that was actually blocking the gate to get on board, so very thankful to the city of Corpus Christi for their crews coming out with their big machines we had about 30 of our crew who out there shoveling sand in the plaza yesterday," she said.
Outside, city crews were still hard at work to clear sand off the roads.
Corpus Christi City Manager Peter Zanoni said the city is currently assessing the cost of damages from the storm for the entire city.
"That includes cost for cleanup restoration of certain infrastructure, we are doing damage assessment and we are probably a little ahead of some cities inundated with water," Zanoni said.
Nueces County was one of over 50 counties declared disaster areas by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, but Zanoni said the county and city would have to reach a certain damage threshold to qualify for any federal funding.
"We sent teams out already through last week over the weekend assessing damage, tracking accounts to clean and restore beaches, infrastructure damage at the marina, the county needs to reach a threshold of $1.6 million," he said.
The state would also have to meet a threshold of $53 million dollars.
Zanoni said it's too soon to tell.
Meantime the folks at the Lex are hoping to make up their loss with a busy summer season as well as their Fourth of July viewing party on the flight deck.