Late ‘Wicked Tuna’ captain’s family, friends request support for jetty project instead of flowers

NAGS HEAD — Following the recent loss of two local fishermen around the dangerous Oregon Inlet, grassroots efforts are underway to revitalize the controversial jetty project that the federal government shut down over two decades ago.

“In lieu of flowers, the family requests your support in establishing a jetty project for Oregon Inlet,” states the online obituary for Charles “Charlie” Marshall Griffin, also known as “Grif.”

The 62-year-old, famed boat captain from Nags Head appeared on “Wicked Tuna: Outer Banks,” a National Geographic reality TV series.

Griffin died March 4 “due to a tragic boating accident in the Outer Banks’ Oregon Inlet,” according to his online obituary.

Chad Dunn, 36, of Wanchese, remains missing after being onboard during the same voyage, and the U.S. Coast Guard suspended the search for him the evening of March 5.

A combined celebration of Griffin’s and Dunn’s lives will take place April 28, according to Griffin’s obituary.

“Grif and Chad passing — there’s no legit reason other than that’s how dangerous this inlet is,” Sierra Smallwood said over the phone Monday.

The 33-year-old Wanchese resident started a petition on March 6 to press legislators and elected officials to support the Oregon Inlet jetty project.

The Change.org petition titled, “Navigating Oregon Inlet: The dire need to save our community” garnered over 5,500 signatures in just two days. It had nearly 8,600 signatures by the afternoon of March 12.

She said it has the full backing of “older gentlemen in the fishing industry” and of Griffin’s former wife, Sandy.

“This is what he would have wanted as well — make it safer,” Smallwood said Sandy Griffin told her.

While her family isn’t in the fishing industry, Smallwood said she’s friends with the Griffins’ son, Jake, and that Dunn was a mutual acquaintance.

She hopes to reach 100,000 petition signatures, and there will be a signing station set up at the joint celebration of life.

Both Griffin and Dunn were well-respected watermen who had crossed the inlet countless times, their peers told state legislators as they shared frustration with the lack of dredging due to permitting red tape at a meeting in Manteo last Wednesday.

Oregon Inlet is “the most dangerous inlet on the East Coast,” which cost over 21 people’s lives and 26 boats from the 1960s through 2017, according to a 2017 CURRENTtv documentary on the inlet.

Because Griffin’s death reverberated with so many people due to his “Wicked Tuna” fame, Smallwood said it made sense to “ride that wave of support and ride that wave of acknowledgement” to press for the jetties.

“When will the lives lost trying to cross the bar matter? When will it become important to protect our watermen, community, businesses and families that have lost our loved ones?,” Smallwood wrote in her petition.

“The need for urgent action is underscored by the fact that this vital waterway has been subject to battles for over 40 years, with the proposed twin jetties being the solution to prevent sand buildup and ensure safe navigation,” she wrote.

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The history of the jetty project

Ever since “a violent storm” created Oregon Inlet on Sept. 7, 1846, the state’s northernmost inlet that connects the Albemarle and Pamlico sounds and the Atlantic Ocean has been “unstable, treacherous” and steadily moving southward, according to the CURRENTtv documentary.

Congress authorized a dredging project in 1950, but it took a decade to achieve the project specifications through “extensive” dredging — and even then, those conditions were “only maintained sporadically,” according to the documentary.

Still, the deeper channel brought larger fishing vessels and a boon to the fishing industry.

“We lost a lot of people off Oregon Inlet, being trapped offshore, not being able to get in through the inlet in a storm,” Alvah Ward, Jr., a retired Department of Business & Industry director with the state’s Department of Commerce, said in the documentary.

In 1970, Congress authorized jetties and the deepening of the channel from 14 to 20 feet.

“In August of 1981, the U.S. Department of the Interior decided to oppose the project” and asked the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) to examine ways to maintain the channel without jetties, according to the documentary.

Bob Peele, director of Wanchese Marine Industrial Park, said the park was North Carolina’s investment in the jetty project, as the federal government asked the state to have an investment.

“In the 1970s the plan was to build a commercial fishing hub, really for the entire Eastern Seaboard of the United States,” Peele said in the documentary. “While this component of the project was built, the jetties never were, so we never got a sustainable, safe, dependable inlet like we were told by the federal government we were going to get.”

The White House Council on Environmental Quality announced in a May 1, 2003, press release that federal agencies had reached consensus, officially ending the “development of the Oregon Inlet jetty proposal.”

That decision concluded “North Carolina’s longest-running environmental battle,” according to a May 3, 2003, article in The Virginian-Pilot. “For only the third time in its 30 years, the White House Council on Environmental Quality mediated a formal standoff between federal agencies.”

While USACE touted the jetties as “the cheapest way to keep the inlet open, the National Marine Fisheries Service worried that it would hurt fish stocks,” according to The Pilot article.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration “opposed the project during formal consultations with the Corps because of a potentially significant impact on the area’s already diminished fisheries,” which depend on the inlet for habitat, according to the White House release.

Two Department of the Interior agencies — the National Park Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service — manage the land on either side of Oregon Inlet, and they “expressed concern over potential erosion of national park and national wildlife refuge lands,” according to the release.

The National Park Service manages Cape Hatteras National Seashore on Hatteras Island, south of the inlet, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service manages Pea Island National Wildlife Refuge on Bodie Island, to the north.

“In reaching the consensus agreement not to proceed with the project, the agencies found that the available economic data contained uncertainties that raised questions as to whether the project would generate even modest net benefits to the local economy,” according to the release.

Economic studies completed since, one that Dare County commissioned in July 2006 and one in May 2014 by Moffatt & Nichol, rebut that claim.

The Moffatt & Nichol study found that the five commercial sectors tied to Oregon Inlet — commercial fishing; seafood packing and processing; boat building and support services; recreational fishing and tourism; and tournament fishing — provided an economic impact of 4,348 jobs and $548.4 million to the state, according to the documentary.

If the inlet were dependable, its economic impact to the state could exceed $1 billion, according to reports on the study.

“The county certainly supports the jetties,” Dare County Manager Bobby Outten said in a phone call Tuesday. “It has always supported it.”

He noted that locals like Harry Schiffman, who is vice chair of the Oregon Inlet Task Force, have been working on the issue for 40 years.

Outten and two county commissioners will visit Washington, D.C., later this month, and he said he expects the jetties to be a topic of conversation, as always.

“I can’t remember ever going to D.C. without talking about the jetties,” he said. “We’ve always had the support of our congressional delegation. That’s who we’re going to meet with.”

Related Articles

• Local News | After the death of 2 fishermen, Outer Banks watermen call for dredging in notoriously rough waters

• Local News | Coast Guard suspends search for man onboard with late ‘Wicked Tuna’ star

• Local News | Capt. Charlie Griffin, ‘Wicked Tuna’ star, dies in boating accident on the Outer Banks

Former Congressman Walter B. Jones in 1968 supported the jetties and other means of improving navigation through the inlet, as did former North Carolina Gov. Robert Scott, according to the CURRENTtv documentary.

More recently, Congressman Greg Murphy (NC-03) introduced legislation in August 2022 to conduct a feasibility study of building two jetties at Oregon Inlet, but the bill never moved out of committee.

A fiscal 2024 community project funding request for $500,000 for “Oregon Inlet Dual Jetty Feasibility Study” is currently listed on his website.

U.S. Sen. Thom Tillis indicated in a statement emailed to The Pilot on Monday that he also backs the project.

“I join the people of Dare County and the fishing community in mourning the tragic loss of life in Oregon Inlet last week,” Tillis said. “Since the news broke of the accident, my office has been in regular communication with both Dare County and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers about the ongoing needs to improve safety and navigation in Oregon Inlet. I will continue to work with local officials and advocate for the federal funds needed to address Oregon Inlet’s unique challenges.”

Neither Murphy nor U.S. Sen. Ted Budd responded to requests for comment by press deadline.

“The community frustration isn’t going to go away,” Smallwood said. “People getting hurt isn’t going to go away.”

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Want to help?

To send money to the families of Charlie Griffin and Chad Dunn:

The NC Watermen United is collecting donations on behalf of the families, with 100% of donations going to the families, according to a March 9 Facebook post.

Checks can be mailed to:

NC Watermen Foundation

P.O. Box 205

Hatteras, NC 27943

Please designate in the memo “The family of” either Charlie Griffin, Chad Dunn or both. Funds will be split equally between the families if both are chosen, unless otherwise noted.