Episode 69 : HURRICANE HUGO A Night Like No Other (Part Two) Special Edition

Destruction, devastation,  and disaster all describe the South Carolina Coast on the 23rd of September 1989.  Hurricane Hugo had torn its way through the State of South Carolina, plowing into Sullivan's Island S.C. and drowning McClellenville S.C. , a small shrimping town, under a massive surge of water.  In Georgetown S.C. , Atalaya , a Spanish style castle villa once owned by Anna Hyatt Huntington, was nearly pulled from its foundations by the power of the Oceans undertow. In Pawley's Island, a new inlet had been cut by Hugo's powerful surge. In Garden City S.C., a town built in what looks more life a sand bar than real land, most of the houses were either gone, destroyed or damaged. 

In this episode we hear the ending of the horrifying night and look over the sea of devastation the storm left behind.  Then we hear the incredible story of South Carolina as its incredible people, under the leadership of its Republican  Governor Carroll Campbell and its Democratic Mayor of Charleston Joe Riley, pick up the pieces and rebuild our State from its worst catastrophic disaster. It is a truly dramatic and extraordinary story of extraordinary resilience from an uncommon people who came together to lift each other out of a disaster. It was  South Carolina's finest hour.  

Hurricane Hugo also left the state totally without power. In the final segment of this show, we watch what is arguably the greatest accomplishment of a power utility company in the history of electric power. Santee Cooper, the South Carolina owned public utility, would have to bring back power after its entire power grid was totally destroyed by Hurricane Hugo. It was the State's first and only black start. A black start means the entire system was 100% down, it had no power generation any where in the system. 

But the heroic people of Santee Cooper did not let that stop them. Their trucks were out before the storm had even left, assessing the damage and figuring out how to get power back to its thousands of customers.  They would do it, with the help of power companies and utilities from around the nation, in just two weeks. An achievement unmatched anywhere in the world even to this day.  We close with the story of Santee Cooper's work  "Bringing Back the Light" to a state that had been left in total darkness.  

(We would like to thank Santee Cooper Electric for the use of footage from their documentary "Bringing Back the Light" and all of the journalism outlets in our state for their coverage, WPDE, WIS, WCIS, The State Newspaper, The Sun News, and The Weather Channel, plus a North Carolina Radio station . )

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