Palm Beach County bruised but not battered in the wake of Hurricane Nicole

One by one Thursday, storm watches and warnings began to lift across South Florida as Tropical Storm Nicole continued its northern trek up the state.

Emergency shelters in Palm Beach County emptied out and evacuees returned to their beachside residences and mobile homes, the dunes there left a little less sandy in the wake of the storm.

Nicole made landfall at about 3 a.m. Thursday, arriving at North Hutchinson Island, south of Vero Beach, as a Category 1 storm. Its late-season arrival came more than a month after Ian grew to Category 4 status as it pummeled Southwest Florida.

Bridges to the barrier islands closed, schools shut down and emergency shelters opened across Palm Beach County in preparation for the storm. It blew through the region relatively quickly, with maximum sustained winds of 75 mph — just above the 74 mph minimum that defines Category 1 on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale.

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The National Hurricane Center agency combed through damage reports Thursday morning as Nicole deteriorated into a tropical storm and churned west, through the center of the state, and then north toward the Florida Panhandle. The full scope of Nicole's effects will become clearer in the coming days, though early reports indicate that Palm Beach County was spared the worst.

Nicole dumped 2 to 5 inches of rain across the county and left some beach and coastal erosion in its wake, according to the National Hurricane Center. Ocean Ridge, near the Boynton Inlet, got the most rain at 4.87 inches.

Nearly 48,000 people lost power in Palm Beach County, though only 2,570 remained without Thursday afternoon, according to Florida Power & Light's online tracker. Emergency shelters became a temporary home to 515 people overnight.

The surprise tornadoes that spawned during Hurricane Ian made no reappearance Wednesday or Thursday, and county buildings sustained no significant damage, said John Jamason, deputy director of public affairs.

"There is a loss of sand, but the dunes are OK," he added.

Early reports Thursday indicate that there was less beach erosion than expected in Palm Beach County, due to a combination of factors including the wind direction and low tide at the time of Nicole's arrival.

Paul Walker, a senior meteorologist with AccuWeather, said despite days of high waves, the winds were coming mostly out of the north and northwest — less damaging to beaches, typically, than winds from the east.

As Nicole neared the coast, the winds in Palm Beach County turned offshore — due west or southwest, which Walker said can work against the waves and mitigate erosion.

Also, when Nicole came ashore at 3 a.m. with its strongest winds, it was just an hour past low tide at the Lake Worth Pier. While coastal street flooding occurred all week with the combination of the higher full-moon tides and Nicole-stoked waves, a high tide at the time of landfall could have meant more damage to the beaches.

Palm Beach County's Environmental Resources Management Department said in a prepared statement that the county's beaches fared "as well as can be expected," pointing to recent beach and dune restoration projects as cause for the dunes' resilience.

The department said it expects some sand will be re-deposited on the beaches over the next few weeks. A full assessment of the damage will take time to complete, the department said, with upcoming surveys expected over the coming weeks.

Just to the north of Palm Beach County, Nicole unearthed Native American human remains on Hutchinson Island and scattered unhatched sea turtle eggs and debris across its beaches. Two people in Orlando were killed by electrocution when they touched downed power lines, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office said.

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Only two other hurricanes in modern history have made landfall in Florida during the month of November, said Sammy Hadi, a meteorologist with the National Hurricane Center. Strong cold fronts during this time of year normally force weather systems northeast, forcing them away from the coast, but a ridge of high-pressure air forced Nicole to move westward into Florida.

As to whether residents can expect to see more late-season storms like it, "the jury's still out," the meteorologist said.

"There hasn't been much research on this topic. The last time it happened on the east coast was 1935, so it's been quite a period," Hadi said. "It'll be interesting to see if we have more trends like this."

Post reporter Kimberly Miller and reporters from TCPalm contributed to this story.

Hannah Phillips is a journalist covering public safety and criminal justice at The Palm Beach Post. You can reach her at hphillips@pbpost.com.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Hurricane Nicole damage: Palm Beach County bruised but not battered