What damaged the Cayucos Pier — and when will it be repaired?

Kathe Tanner
·3 min read

As suspected, giant logs and tree trunks probably were what doomed the far end of the Cayucos pier during the late February storm surge.

The damage left the pier drooping and wobbly, minus at least five support pilings, a batter piling and part of the upper railing.

“It’s hanging there like a cantilevered deck with no support,” Shaun Cooper, deputy director of San Luis Obispo County Parks and Recreation, reiterated to The Tribune on Thursday.

For public safety reasons, the entire pier was closed off periodically during the heaviest parts of recent storms, but portions deemed safe have reopened since then.

The unsupported portion of the pier will remain closed until it can be repaired.

There’s a lot of work to be done before that can happen, Cooper said, but officials and local residents all hope the repairs can happen before the start of the next winter season.

The Cayucos Pier lost five pilings in a February 2024 storm that left the end of the structure dangling over the ocean. The pier has been mostly reopened with the end closed off. The county hopes to complete full repairs by the fall ahead of next winter’s storms.
The Cayucos Pier lost five pilings in a February 2024 storm that left the end of the structure dangling over the ocean. The pier has been mostly reopened with the end closed off. The county hopes to complete full repairs by the fall ahead of next winter’s storms.

Officials may never know what tore the pier pilings off

Residents say they often see logs, branches and even large tree trunks being driven down into the ocean by rain-swollen Cayucos Creek waters, where the debris can turn into wave-powered battering rams.

That ocean junk has been showing up all winter, as evidenced by some big logs still on the sand near the pier and “the wall.” At least one massive trunk is already partially buried under sand near the shoreline and the pier. Other sizable flotsam and jetsam, such as big bales of cotton and empty wine or whiskey barrels, have also made their way to the beach this season.

As Cooper reported soon after the crucial pieces of the pier washed ashore, a preliminary assessment by engineer Bruce Elster of Shoreline Engineering in Morro Bay conjectured that a very large log could have slammed into the end of the pier in the storm swell and high tide.

“There was physical evidence that the piles had been impacted by a tree trunk,” Elster said Friday. “It appears that the piles were broken out at the sea floor, sheared off at the ‘mudline.’ They didn’t topple. It looked like the piles had their feet knocked out from underneath them.”

The sun rises Thursday, Feb. 22, 2024, over the damaged Cayucos Pier. Five pilings were knocked loose from the end of the pier in the recent storms. The pier has reopened, but the end will be fenced off until repairs can be completed, hopefully by the fall, the county said.
The sun rises Thursday, Feb. 22, 2024, over the damaged Cayucos Pier. Five pilings were knocked loose from the end of the pier in the recent storms. The pier has reopened, but the end will be fenced off until repairs can be completed, hopefully by the fall, the county said.

Or one of the first two pilings ripped away from the pier earlier in the storm siege could have taken out the others.

“It’s kind of like having loose teeth in your mouth,” Cayucos resident Gary Bettencourt told the Cayucos Citizens Advisory Council Wednesday night. “Losing one tooth puts the others at risk.”

The broken pilings that came ashore appear to have been “‘sheared off,’” Cooper said of the Elster’s observations on the day after the damage was done.

Compounding the onslaught from floating debris were king tides and the force of the unrelenting storm swells.

More will be known after a complete engineering analysis and damage assessments are done, but doing those studies on and below the water will have to wait until the sea calms and clears.

Several pilings were knocked loose from the end of the Cayucos Pier in the February 2024 storms. The pier has reopened, but the end will be fenced off until repairs can be completed, hopefully by the fall, the county said.
Several pilings were knocked loose from the end of the Cayucos Pier in the February 2024 storms. The pier has reopened, but the end will be fenced off until repairs can be completed, hopefully by the fall, the county said.

Once the studies are complete, which Cooper hopes can happen by early summer, “it will take another 60 to 90 days to have plans drawn for the repairs, which could go out to bid for construction by the end of summer/start of fall.

“We hope to get a waiver from the California Coastal Commission,” which could require lengthy environmental studies before the a coastal development permit allows work to start, he added.

The county can use up to about $120,000 in accumulated interest from a community endowment established with excess donations townspeople and others gave toward rebuilding the pier, a project completed in October 2015, Bettencourt said.

The county and pier enthusiasts will then have to find grants, donations and other funds to pay for the pier’s repairs, Cooper said. The endowment’s principal, at least $500,000, cannot be used.

These large logs on the sand near the Cayucos Pier are among the ocean debris that washed down the swollen waters of Cayucos Creek to the shore during this winter’s storm. Officials conjecture that one or more free-floating, large tree trunks or logs may have bashed the end of the pier in late February 2024, knocking loose support pilings and other parts of the pier. Studies must be done before permanent repairs can begin.