Now that’s a housing freeze.
A famed stilted home on Long Island collapsed when the waters of Napeague Bay froze solid, leaving town officials scratching their heads about how to remove it, an official said Wednesday.
The beloved, much-photographed structure in the Lazy Point section of Amagansett plunged to its icy fate Sunday when frigid temperatures snapped the wooden posts that have held it up for decades.
After days of brutal cold gripped the Northeast US last week, an iconic Hamptons “stilt house” finally toppled into the bay. Jameskatsipis.com“It has always, to me, been an iconic view of something that you don’t see too often out here,” town of East Hampton deputy supervisor David Lys told The Post.
“It’s a harbinger to the effects of sea level rise,” he said.
Photos showed the home, which had stood perched on wooden pillars for more than 70 years, now partially submerged in the ice-choked waters of Gardiners Bay.
The town was scrambling to come up with a plan to remove the vacant, privately owned home, which sits on the northern side of South Fork and had long lured folks in search of a postcard-worthy sunrise scene.
The beloved, much-photographed structure in the Lazy Point section of Amagansett plunged to its icy fate Sunday when frigid temperatures snapped the wooden posts that have held it up for decades. Courtesy Tim Tierney
“It has always, to me, been an iconic view of something that you don’t see too often out here,” town of East Hampton deputy supervisor David Lys told The Post. Courtesy Tim Tierney“Everyone knew about it,” said Lys, who has a panoramic shot of the home in his office.
“It was built like a brick house. It stood many storm surges out there, even lots of ice. But anything that is exposed to the elements, there’s only a certain amount of time.”
Relentless erosion stripped away the sandy north-facing shoreline, leaving the home isolated above the bay, fully surrounded by water since about 2004, according to News12.
Relentless erosion chewed away the sandy shoreline, leaving the home marooned in water since around 2004. Jameskatsipis.com
The aging wooden supports that kept the house elevated for decades gave way after Winter Storm Fern battered New York and prolonged a deep freeze that followed Jameskatsipis.comThe town was working with marine patrol, environmental officials, and the property owner, listed as Gary Ryan in tax records, on “a plan to isolate the area until we get a contractor in to remove it,” Lys said.
“Those discussions are happening fast and furious right now. It will have to be removed before it is a hazard to not only navigation, but also to the shoreline.”
The town has no plans to preserve the home, which has the address of 163 Mulford Lane and has been vacant for a few years.
While records do not pinpoint the exact date of construction, the structure’s roots date back to the late 1940s or early 1950s — a time when the area was primarily a fishing community, Billy Kalbacher told the East Hampton Press in 2017.
Relentless erosion stripped away the sandy north-facing shoreline, leaving the home isolated above the bay, fully surrounded by water since about 2004, according to reports. Jameskatsipis.comKalbacher noted that his sister and brother-in-law, John Easevoli, used to live in the home before it was surrounded by water.
“I mean a real fishing community, when guys from the city, the Bronx, Brooklyn came out with their cronies, 1948, 1950, and they all built shacks on the beach,” Kalbacher said.
Easevoli, a carpenter, built and restored the home before the family relocated to Napeague around 1966 or 1967, according to the outlet.
The Northern Lights appear in the sky behind the home. Jameskatsipis.com“It used to be 100 feet to the water; now the shack is in the water and about 30 feet from shore,” Kalbacher said at the time.
Just two weeks before the collapse, the Northern Lights briefly illuminated the sky behind the home.
Last week marked the first time since 2015 that Gardiners Bay had frozen over, the East Hampton Press reported.
