Owner picking up pieces after dock destroyed by storm

BEAN STATION, Tenn. (WVLT) - Nearly one-quarter of Huff’s German Creek Marina is in disarray following a storm Friday afternoon.

Metal is twisted around other metal pieces, pontoon boats rest on top of one another and others are turned over in the water with nothing but propellers sticking up in the air.

”It’s pretty devastating, this is my livelihood it’s pretty depressing to look at walking down to work every day,” said Owner Nick Huff.

Huff is reacting nearly 5 days after the marina he has solely owned for a year remains damaged.

Wednesday, he had an electrical engineer out to work on restoring electricity to houseboats on the other side of the dock and the marinas shop that rests in the dark.

”I’m trying to be as proactive as I can, get different people in here to take a look at it. People are saying it shouldn’t take too long but we will see how it goes,” said Huff.

On a warm Wednesday, with a light breeze flowing across Cherokee Lake, boat owners are stopping by to see what the damage is to their boat and offer words of support to Huff.

”It is like a family down here, you get to know everybody, you get to see ‘em every weekend and we try to look out for each other,” said Keith Oakley who has a houseboat docked at Huffs.

Oakley made it out relatively unscathed.

”I feel sorry for a lot more people than I do myself our damage is bad enough but there’s a lot of people who are affected much worse than we are,” said Oakley.

His boat is still damaged, but insurance should cover what was torn apart, but on the other side of the dock, with boats torn to shreds, the clean-up process will take well into the summer.

With just weeks to go until Memorial Day weekend, Huff is determined to get parts of his business up and running to be able to mark the unofficial start of summer.

While those who have boats submerged or wrapped with metal, they’ll wait until insurance can tell them what the next steps are.

For those who were spared, Like Oakley, he asks for thoughts and prayers to those impacted, knowing what is supposed to be a joyous start to the summer, right now is anything but.

”Say a prayer for these people that no one was hurt that’s the great thing but items can be replaced, lives can’t,” said Oakley.

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