THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, August 18, 1995 TAG: 9508180369
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: BY LON WAGNER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SALVO LENGTH: Short : 42 lines
One of the first motorists allowed to come to Hatteras Island after a state of emergency was lifted Thursday was a native coming back to his boyhood home.
But the return to his roots wasn't easy for Chris Pettit, his girlfriend and her three children. After a three-day trip, they were kept off the island by Hurricane Felix and had to spend the night in a Manteo Motel only 35 miles from their new home.
So much for the welcome wagon.
They had driven a moving truck and a pickup, and towed their car from Clarksdale, Miss.
Getting so close and then being forced to stop was frustrating.
The only road on Hatteras Island to Salvo to begin a new life was impassible after the ocean washed over the dunes Wednesday at Pea Island.
``I said, `You're going to charge me summer rates?' '' Pettit said of the stay at the motel. ``I'm having to sit here because of the hurricane. It kind of fried my butt, but what can you do?''
When they finally made it to Salvo about noon Thursday, they looked just like the returning evacuees the TV crews wanted to videotape.
A camera crew pulled alongside them on the highway to get a few shots.
``Yeah, we look like the Hatteras Hillbillies,'' Pettit said. ``All you need is granny sitting up there on a rocking chair with a shotgun.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
PAUL AIKEN/Staff
Sheri Culpepper, left, and her sister Katrina help unload the car
with their mother's boyfriend, Chris Pettit. The family is moving
from Mississippi to Pettit's former family home in Salvo, N.C.
KEYWORDS: HURRICANE FELIX by CNB