Ophelia spends fury at coast (newsobserver.com )

newsobserver.com | Front Page News: "BUXTON -- Ophelia is expected to continue a slow, erratic jog off the North Carolina coast today, its weakening wind and rain scraping the chin of the Outer Banks.

The fading cyclone, downgraded Thursday night to a tropical storm, spent most of the day camped south of Cape Hatteras. As Ophelia delayed its departure, residents in the storm's tight, coastal corridor of destruction started picking through the wreckage.

The storm surge that ripped through Salter Path on Bogue Banks blew through the back end of a strip of businesses and flooded a Methodist church. Farther south, on North Topsail Beach in Onslow County, more than 80 badly damaged homes and condominiums showed the storm's destructive power.

But among those who weathered Ophelia, there was a sense of dodged-bullet relief. 'It's not as bad as it could have been by far,' Bill Glover, 83, an architect, said as he swept up limbs around his house in Morehead City."