{"id":8716298,"date":"2023-01-14T07:00:46","date_gmt":"2023-01-14T15:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eastbaytimes.com\/?p=8716298&preview=true&preview_id=8716298"},"modified":"2023-01-15T10:55:20","modified_gmt":"2023-01-15T18:55:20","slug":"capitola-village-and-wharf-storm-smashed-then-storm-smashed-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eastbaytimes.com\/2023\/01\/14\/capitola-village-and-wharf-storm-smashed-then-storm-smashed-now\/","title":{"rendered":"Capitola Village and wharf: Storm-smashed then, storm-smashed now"},"content":{"rendered":"

A huge storm and high tide that sent waves topping 20 feet slamming into the tourist mecca of Capitola last week, wreaking severe damage upon the city\u2019s historic wharf and waterfront restaurant row, was highly dramatic \u2014 but not an anomaly.<\/p>\n

Capitola has been a storm target since its early days as the privately owned \u201cCamp Capitola\u201d seaside resort, long before its incorporation as a city in 1949. And the wharf that lost a 40-foot section Jan. 5? It\u2019s been there before. And not just once.<\/p>\n

Capitola Village, long a beloved coastal getaway for Bay Area residents and a destination for visitors from all over the world, sits along a south-facing beach on a broad cove just down the coast from Santa Cruz on Monterey Bay. A 2017 City of Capitola report notes that \u201csignificant storms, with associated damage, strike the Monterey Bay communities with a frequency of one large storm every 3 to 4 years,\u201d and that, \u201cThis equates to a 25% to 33% chance of a large storm occurring within Capitola in a given year.\u201d Climate change effects on the Pacific Ocean, and on Soquel Creek that flows between Capitola Village\u2019s colorful Venetian apartments and its beachfront restaurants as it meets the ocean, \u201ccould increase the probability and intensity of flooding in Capitola,\u201d the report says<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Capitola Historical Museum curator Deborah Osterberg dug back into the past 100 years and compiled a litany of weather-wrought catastrophes<\/a> befalling the Capitola village and wharf.<\/p>\n

\"Men
Men clamber through ocean-delivered debris after a storm hit Capitola\u2019s waterfront in 1913. Hotel Capitola, in the background, burned to the ground in 1929. (courtesy of Capitola Historical Museum) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"The
The Capitola Wharf, with a section torn out by a 1913 storm in nearly the same area of the structure that was taken out by the Jan. 5, 2023 storm. (courtesy of Capitola Historical Museum) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In 1913, a surging ocean full of debris swept across the beach, into the village and up Capitola Avenue. \u201cHuge waves smashed against the wharf, taking out a 200-foot section,\u201d Osterberg said. A fisherman named Alberto Gibelli, who had gone out to the end of the wharf to secure his boats and equipment, was left stranded until a rescue boat arrived and a rope and life preserver were tossed. Gibelli \u201ctied the rope under his arms and leapt into the ocean and he was pulled to safety,\u201d Osterberg said.<\/p>\n

That storm destroyed a section of the wharf in the same area as the portion washed away lasts week. According to the Santa Cruz Museum of Natural History, during episodes of very high surf, a sandbar develops near the Capitola Wharf in roughly the same spot. \u201cThis influences where waves will crest and unleash their force,\u201d the museum tweeted <\/a>Saturday, with photos of the damage in 1913 and 2023. \u201cHence, history repeating itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thirteen years later, Mother Nature struck again, with the same kind of double-whammy delivered to Capitola last week: giant waves on top of a high tide. Again, the village was flooded as far as Capitola Avenue, a block from the ocean. And as occurred last week, the Venetian apartments \u2014 the picturesque row of habitations starring today in many a social media post \u2014 suffered damage. So high were the waves that they slammed into the Hotel Capitola\u2019s second floor. A bathhouse and boathouse with distinctive arches in its beachfront facade made it through, but its wooden dressing rooms were splintered apart.<\/p>\n

\"Storm
Storm hitting Capitola in 1926 with waves surging into the bathhouse\/boathouse (courtesy of Capitola Historical Museum) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"A
A person paddles a canoe through a flooded Capitola Village a half-block from the beach after a 1926 storm. (courtesy of Capitola Historical Museum \u2014 Macdonald Collection) <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n