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The Island Moon Published by Island Moon Publishing, LLC 15201 S. Padre Island Drive Ste. 250 Corpus Christi, TX. 78418 editor@islandmoon.com (361) 949-7700
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The Barrel Grand Opening A10
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4th of July Boat Parade A14
The
Island Moon The Island Newspaper since 1996
Island Area News ● Events ● Entertainment
July 5, 2012
Happy 236th Birthday USA!
It’s a known fact that eighty percent of the people who visit The Island from the San Antonio/Austin corridor make up their mind whether to head this way after noon on Thursday. That means when they turn on the morning shows on Friday and the weather dudes predict rain on the Coast they’re not coming. It doesn’t matter if it rains or not, if the prediction is for rain they stay home and that’s what happened last weekend. Rain squalls from The Island to Austin meant slow business all along the Coast but this weekend promises to be better. Shifting winds and a full moon midweek have made for high tides in the Laguna and the canals. Water in the main canal has been up over a foot for more than two weeks and kept the water roiled to a murky brown. Along the beach the water has been very nice but the rip currents due to the odd weather continue. As of this writing, certain types of fireworks have been banned in Nueces County but, of course not in Kleberg County just south of Bob Hall Pier. Come to think of it nothing has ever been banned in Kleberg County and so on the night of the Fourth – after this paper has been put to bed – we expect the skies above Kleberg to be full of gunpowder and the glow of the resultant Annual Fourth of July Brush Fire. Anybody can have fireworks but fireworks with a brushfire…now that’s something.
Return of The Island Cop Those of you who have lived on The Island for a few years will remember Corpus Christi Police Officer Chris Hooper – known to everyone here as The Island Cop. In the years before CCPD established regular beats for officers on The Island Chris was about the only police officer we ever saw hereabouts. Chris wrote a column for the Moon and whether it was a gunfight or a barking dog the cell phone provided Chris by the Padre Island Business Association would ring and he would fix the problem. In fact it was Chris who helped us stop the Burglary Invasion of 2007 when thugs from OTB were going around The Island ringing doorbells and kicking in front doors. They hit more than 45 houses before we managed to get the attention of the CCPD brass who responded by establishing the current beat system which keeps three patrolmen on The Island around the clock and stopped the burglaries. Then about four years ago CCPD kicked Chris upstairs and he became a supervisor on the far side of town where rookie supervisors go to pay their dues. But now the good news; Chris is back on The Island, this time as a supervisor in the Bravo District which covers The Island and goes OTB to Staples Street. He’s been back on Island duty for a few weeks and works The Island from Thursday-Sunday. We’re glad to have him back and will see if we can get him to pick up his writing for the Moon.
Schlitterbahn Update Planning and design work continues for the Schlitterbahn Waterpark and Resort. We hear that the new plans call for a lengthening of the Lazy River ride in the park. Groundbreaking is still anticipated in the next six to eight weeks. We’ll advise of any changes if they happen. In the meantime, say hello if you see us Around The Island.
SUV in Packery Channel
4th of July Island Style
Friday, July 13, 10:30 at City Hall
Texas Department of Insurance Schedules Windstorm Hearing for Corpus Christi Possible revisions in plans could hold dire consequences for Island property owners A move to hike windstorm insurance rates for the fourteen coastal counties in Texas by as much as 200% will get a special hearing by the Texas Department of Insurance in Corpus Christi. The hearing is set for City Hall council chambers at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, July 13. The push by State Representative John T. Smithee, (R-Amarillo) and backed by the chair of the state insurance commission would raise rates in the coastal region prior to the convening of the Texas Legislature next January. The move is being vigorously opposed by legislators from the coastal region, including the State Representative from The Island, Republican, Todd Hunter, who requested the special meeting in Corpus Christi to allow local residents to hear information on the proposed changes and voice opinions prior to the action by the state regulators. The fourteen Texas coastal counties are currently in a common risk pool which charges rates of approximately 1% per year for each $100,000 of replacement value of a home. Under the proposed rates that number could increase to about $3 for each $100,000 of replacement value. Under the plan Islanders could see their rates soar if they are placed in a separate risk group which separates them from other areas of Corpus Christi. Smithee last week released a statement saying the damage from a large hurricane to the Corpus Christi area could cause as much as $14 billion in damage, a number considerable larger than the total amount of taxable property in the area. Island property owners are encouraged to attend the July 13 hearing.
This just in…
NOAA ReportMermaids Not Real The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration took the unusual step this week of issuing a statement denying the exestence of mermaids. Mermaids, those half-human, half-fish sirens of the sea — are legendary sea creatures chronicled in maritime cultures since time immemorial. The ancient Greek epic poet Homer wrote of them in The Odyssey. In the ancient Far East, mermaids were the wives of powerful sea-dragons, and served as trusted messengers between their spouses and the emperors on land. The aboriginal people of Australia call mermaids yawkyawks – a name that may refer to their mesmerizing songs. But are mermaids real? No evidence of aquatic humanoids has ever been found. Why, then, do they occupy the collective unconscious of nearly all seafaring peoples? That’s a question best left to historians, philosophers, and anthropologists. female figures first appear in cave paintings in the late Paleolithic (Stone Age) period some 30,000 years ago, when modern humans gained dominion over the land and, presumably, began to sail the seas. Half-human creatures, called chimeras, also abound in mythology — in addition to mermaids, there were wise centaurs, wild satyrs, and frightful minotaurs, to name but a few. The NOAA article was written from publicly available sources because “we don’t have a mermaid science program”, National Ocean Service spokeswoman Carol Kavanagh told the BBC. She said that at least two people had written to the agency asking about the creatures. The inquiries followed May’s broadcast of Mermaids: The Body Found, on the Discovery Channel’s Animal Planet network.
This car was fished out of Packery Channel early Wednesday morning. About half a dozen cars have found their way into the channel in the last few years.
Year 15, Issue 430
The program was a work of fiction but its winkand-nod format apparently led some viewers to believe it was a science education show, the Discovery Channel has acknowledged.
The 13th Annual Fourth of July Watercraft Parade went off under clear skies in breezy weather Wednesday night with a record number of boats and played to decks along Island canals lined with noisy spectators. The later 7:30 p.m. start for this year’s event meant cooler evening temps for spectators and more time for last minute decorating for boat owners. The boats mustered at the Padre Island Yacht Club after the First Annual Padre Island Cardboard Boat Race then boats set off down the Main Canal past the judging station at Ann and Harold’s houses on Three Fathoms Bank.
Miss Liberty put in an appearance on the bow of one entry while another pulled a canoe load of kids. More than thirty boats took part, including a Customs boat with 900 horsepower in case a Man Overboard was reported but no emergency runs were necessary although one dog found his way into a canal after a dropped hotdog weenie lured him over the high side, but another proffered weenie brought him quickly back to dry land.
All in all it was a great Fourth of July parade on our Island. It’s time to start thinking about the La Posada Lighted Boat Parade in December.
More photos of the Island’s Independence Day Celebration on page A14
Trivia Question of the Week
What was the Mustang Water Exchange Pass, where was it, and why is it not still open? Fish Pass a monument to bureaucratic folly By Dale Rankin This one is a bit tricky as what was called the Mustang Water Exchange Pass when it was built is now known as Fish Pass. When it comes to passes through the Island the first thing to know is that the passes have moved frequently over the years and even if they stayed in the same place their names change in a seemingly random fashion.
Greg Smith 2012
This stretch of the summer has to go down as one of the strangest we have seen in a while. First, the 4th of July holiday comes in the middle of the week which raises the question of which weekend is really the Holiday Weekend. Mother Nature had her say when she dropped heavy rain on The Island Saturday leading the tourists to stay away in droves.
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The local expert on such things is Islander Greg Smith so we consulted him for our answer.
Natural state
New Packery
By Dale Rankin editor@islandmoon.com
Prior to intervention by humans the main opening between Corpus Christi Bay and the Gulf was Corpus Christi Pass. Generally speaking Corpus Christi Pass began on the bay side near where Fish Pass is now located and ran parallel to the beach to a point near the end of Whitecap where it entered the Gulf. That means that the current Michael J. Ellis Seawall and the buildings behind it would have been on Mustang rather than Padre Island. Feeding off of Corpus Christi Pass and running through the Island to the Gulf were various passes over the years that went by various names and moved up and down the Island according to currents and storms.
2009
Around The Island
Next Publication Date: 7/12/2012
Up until the mid-1800s the deepest of these passes was about fourteen feet deep, but only 3-4 feet at the bar meaning large ships could not enter. Two events greatly altered this natural configuration. The first was the dredging of the ship channel which altered the currents in the bay and resulted in the silting up of the water exchange passes. The next event was the completion of State Highway 361 (originally called the 17-Mile Road) which was built without any bridges and blocked all the passes through The Island. No sooner had the road been completed than a move began by civic minded people – in those days there was no such thing as environmentalists – to cut a permanent water exchange pass through The Island. In 1957 the Game and Fish Fund No. 9 was created to raise money for the project and the Parks and Wildlife Commission recommended the pass in its budgets in 1965 and 1967.
2009 aerial photo of Mustang Island, bridges are marked in red.
Let the infighting begin
Mother Nature had her own idea of how traffic should go and water should flow and when Hurricane Beulah raked across The Island in 1967 she cut more than a dozen passes through the Island and left the road from North Padre to Port A cut into pieces. It took several months before the passage along the Island road was completely rebuilt. Fish Pass was opened to the Gulf with or without governmental approval and the need to make the pass permanent took on a new urgency. Trivia Continued on A8