The twin storms that rocked Maine’s coast last week did unprecedented damage to homes, businesses and infrastructure, when high winds and tides combined to swamp low-lying areas.
While the dollar value of all that destruction is still being tallied, there were plenty of reports of places that were badly hit. Some of the most obvious damage was to a handful of historic and cultural landmarks located along the shoreline.
Here are some of the iconic Maine sites destroyed, damaged or otherwise affected by the storms on Wednesday and Saturday:
Pemaquid Point Lighthouse
The nearly 200-year-old lighthouse that’s featured on Maine’s quarter was damaged on Wednesday, when the first of the two storms brought high winds and heavy rains.
Although the main tower of the lighthouse was unaffected, parts of its fog bell house were reduced to bricks. Bristol town officials now hope to rebuild the popular site at Pemaquid Point Lighthouse Park. The bell itself was unscathed after it was taken down last summer because of rotting wood.
The storm also brought relatively minor damage to the popular Portland Head Light in Cape Elizabeth.
Willard Beach fishing shacks
The three shacks were frequently featured in scenic photos of Fisherman’s Point, a section of South Portland’s Willard Beach. Now, they have become one of the defining images of the devastation from last week’s storm.
The buildings, which had interior timbers more than 200 years old, were washed away when the astronomical high tide hit around noon Saturday.
Reid State Park
While officials are still assessing damage to Maine’s public lands, one of the worst hit appeared to be the beachfront Reid State Park in Georgetown, where a road was flooded on Wednesday and there was extensive erosion. The park is now closed until further notice.
Acadia National Park shipwreck
In this case, the storms did not do any damage, per se. But they did unearth a long-buried shipwreck. The Tay was a schooner that ran aground at Sand Beach in Acadia National Park during a storm in the summer of 1911.
It was buried for decades, but the storm on Wednesday moved enough sand that the wreck could be seen again.