Following two storms this hurricane season that made landfall on the Atlantic coast, many are now scrambling to rebuild.
What You Need To Know
- Coquina Rock needed in Flagler County
- Atlantic Coast approved beach sand in high demand
- Beach sand orders more than doubled since Nicole
Following two storms that made landfall on the Atlantic coast, many are now scrambling to rebuild. The demand for raw materials is great, with a limited amount of places contractors can go.
The Environmental Land Services quarry in Flagler County is non-stop busy with trucks coming and going with materials for contractors.
With less than a handful of quarries like this along the Atlantic coast, ELS is currently producing two of the most coveted items these properties now need. Atlantic coast approved beach sand to help strengthen shorelines, and the coquina rock to help rebuild seawalls.
The sound of a heavy, machine hammering rock can be heard from a mile away. Michael Morea’s work cube isn’t the most traditional one. Inside an excavator, he is driving a heavy duty hammer through solid rock.
“You got to find the right material. It’s down deep,” the owner of Environmental Land Services in Flagler County Michael Morea says.
The owner of ELS (Environmental Land Services) in Flagler County is currently working seven days a week to ensure contractors and municipalities along the coast in Flagler and Volusia County have what they need to rebuild.
“I’ve been working 20-hour days, around the clock to just try and help,” Morea says. “I have been working so much over here I haven’t even seen the beaches. I don’t even know what they look like.”
And as soon as Mike is done hammering rock, he has little time to hop in to his next excavator, where a line of dump trucks are sticking to a schedule for drop off.
Currently, Morea loads about 60 dump trucks with crushed coquina rock a day. These rocks will be used for rock sea walls. Down the 100 plus acre pit, a stop, fill, and go- assembly line for Atlantic coast approved beach sand rarely has a break.
“Before the storm we were looking 80 maybe 88 trucks a day,” ELS heavy Equipment Operator Mark Bonner explains. “Now we are at 250 plus. Sometimes close to 300.”
All of this, headed back to what was mostly lost to sea. Beach sand now needed to be put back to help strengthen shorelines or prevent future erosion from happening.
“It’s very urgent,” Bonner stresses. “This is the place to get it right here. Most pits, they got dirt, which you can’t use. This here, we have the product to replenish.”
Until everyone has what they need, Mike and his team are continuing to work around the clock, knowing the anxiousness and urgency others are feeling.
“The pressure is on me because I don’t want to see people’s property go away,” Morea states. “I am trying to help so these people can continue with their homes.”
Permits and plans for seawalls will take time, but the materials to help rebuild are already going out.
What makes the sand from E-L-S’s quarry suitable for use on the beaches in Volusia and Flagler it is not just the grain size. It is also because it has been tested and approved by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and engineers.
