Bad, but could have been worse

>>> now let's go down the atlantic coast . one of the first places to bear the early brunt of this storm. though in typical veteran north carolina hurricane style, along with our own kerry sanders , atlantic beach , north carolina , to be exact, kerry, good evening.

>> reporter: good evening, brian. this is where hurricane irene made landfall. and despite the hurricane's fury, things are in remarkably good shape. still, hurricane irene , well, she left her mark. along the north carolina coast where irene hammered the coastline with pounding surf and wind, today was all about the clean-up. on atlantic beach , crews started early, putting sand back on the beach. hurricane irene took direct aim here. yet inside the beach front tackle box bar, it's hard to believe there ever was a category 1 hurricane.

>> but we were just tickled to death that no water came in. we're just waiting for electricity so we can get back open.

>> reporter: with 100 mile per hour gusts, trees are down, and with power still out, today folks cooked lunch on an open fire . on the outer banks these pictures of north carolina highway 12 , the storm surge washed the road away in five places and left boats scattered on dry land . in nags head , frank spent today cleaning out his garage. it was swamped.

>> actually, the waves made it worse. there was about two, three-foot waves breaking right at the garage door and coming in. nothing i could do about that.

>> reporter: to the north, as irene hit virginia, it was still a hurricane packing a still powerful punch. the relentless surf knocked out a virginia beach pier, led to a mid-storm rescue of a couple and their cat stranded on a sailboat which winds tore the roof off this beach side house. in ocean city , maryland, where tourists evacuated, the boardwalk was buried in sand, but no significant destruction here. today the boardwalk was back open for business .

>> it was a long time last night. but i can tell you, we dodged the missile here in ocean city .

>> reporter: irene spawned tornadoes in two states, including this twister in delaware that destroyed a home and damaged a dozen more. in washington, old glory over the capitol was tattered, but still flying. we got some additional photographs from ground level of north carolina highway 12 . you can see here where the road literally just disappears. from the air it looks like a dotted line. the north carolina department of transportation plans to have ferry service to get people in and out of there while they deal with the longer-term project of rebuilding that road, brian.

>> that picture on top, the flag on top of the capitol really gets your attention. kerry sanders , i'm glad the news is so relatively good where you're standing. thanks for your reporting over these two