Estate Planning Attorney inMcClellanville, SC

MCCLELLANVILLE, S.C. (WCBD) – Hurricane Hugo struck the South Carolina coast in the dark of night on Sept. 21, 1989. It was a powerful Category 4 storm with sustained winds near 140 mph.

One of the hardest-hit communities was McClellanville, a small fishing town north of Charleston that was inundated by a storm surge estimated at nearly 20 feet. Homes and businesses were destroyed, and shrimp boats were tossed ashore like toys.

More than three decades later, Hugo remains the benchmark for hurricane devastation in the Lowcountry. For those who lived through it, the storm is still remembered not only for its destruction, but also for the fear and uncertainty that unfolded hour by hour.

One of those survivors is Gary White, who has lived in the McClellanville area since he was a teenager.

“They have a saying up here: before the storm and after the storm,” White said. “That’s how you describe events. In the 70s and 80s, we had not had very many hurricanes at all, and we were very ignorant of what a hurricane could do.”

Like many residents, White said he did not initially grasp the magnitude of the threat. He spent the morning surfing on Folly Beach and did not realize the storm’s potential until later in the day.

As Hugo barreled toward the coast, local officials urged residents to leave immediately.

Charleston County Council Chair Linda Lombard issued an urgent evacuation message from the county’s Emergency Operations Center.

“I can still remember her exact words. If you’re still here, get out now. I felt my first little bit of fear,” he said. “So, we were watching Rob Fowler that day for a few hours.”

Despite the warnings, White’s family decided to remain in McClellanville.

White said they decided to stay on his father’s boat. “We had my sister, my wife, and my two-month-old son, and my parents. Everybody else had left,” he said.

“We were on the boat, and the tide was just getting so high we thought maybe it wasn’t safe.”

As conditions worsened, they returned to the house. Soon, Hugo’s sounds made it clear they were facing something unlike anything they had experienced before.

“The noises the wind made. I had never heard sounds like that before. I actually use the word supernatural to describe it.”

White said the situation deteriorated rapidly during the night.

“Sometime in the middle of the night, I heard my mother scream, and she closed the door because water was coming in. And as soon as she did, it started pouring in the window.”

McClellanville and neighboring Awendaw experienced some of the highest storm surge levels recorded during Hugo. As floodwaters rose, White’s concern shifted from his own safety to his family’s.

“I wasn’t scared I would drown. I was a very good swimmer. I was a surfer. I thought, I’ll be okay, but I was very worried for the people around me and especially the baby. That was my biggest worry. You know, if the water kept coming up and we were all floating in the water, how were we going to keep him above water the entire time?”

As water filled the home, the family was forced to escape through a window and climb to higher ground.

White demonstrated how they climbed to the home’s roof using a pump house as the floodwaters surged around them.

“The pump house we got on, got up on the roof. We were up there for about three or four hours. I can remember that I could get on the edge right here and sit and dangle my feet in the water. That’s how high the water was,” he recalled.

A short distance away, hundreds of residents were enduring their own fight for survival.

Lincoln High School had been designated as a hurricane shelter. Maps incorrectly listed the school’s elevation at 20 feet above sea level when its actual elevation was closer to 10 feet. Several feet of water entered the building, forcing evacuees onto tables and into the rafters to escape the rising water.

“Lincoln High School is right through those woods,” Gary showed us as he retraced his steps that night. “There were 1,500 people there, and during the height of the storm, we could hear those people screaming.”

When daylight finally arrived, White and his father ventured into the floodwaters to assess what remained of their town.

The destruction was unlike anything they had ever seen.

McClellanville was so heavily damaged that the U.S. Marines restricted access to the town while troops cleared roads, removed downed power lines, and searched for victims.

“There’s a picture of my father’s boat leaning against Gedney Howe’s; he’s a local lawyer; there’s a picture of my father’s boat leaning against his house,” he said, demonstrating the power of the water that night.

For many residents who evacuated, the devastation came as a shock when they returned. But White said those who experienced Hugo firsthand carried a different understanding of what happened that night.

“It’s just something that if you don’t go through it – you don’t know what it’s like; you can’t describe it.”