Port Aransas is a city in Nueces County, Texas, on Mustang Island, across the Aransas Bay. The city has been around for a long time, and has a long, colorful history: Port Aransas was a favorite of pirates in the early 19th century. Jean Lafitte, along with various other pirates, spent lots of time on the Texas coast. Mustang Island was one of his favorite places, and Jean Lafitte and many other pirates often made camp there. Local lore says that pirate treasure is buried on the island. The treasure chest is supposedly marked by a Spanish silver dagger.
Instead of the poor fishing village that it used to be, Port Aransas has now become a multi-million-dollar fishing, beach, and resort village, with summer populations sometimes swelling to 60,000 or more. It’s main business is now tourism. It has a humid, subtropical climate, with temperatures very similar to those of other Gulf Coast regions like Deep South Texas and Southern Florida. There are six ferries that connect them to the mainland; each of them can move 100 cars per hour.
Because the city of Port Aransas is on an island, it has a long history of hurricane and tropical storm damage. A 1916 Texas Hurricane destroyed Port Aransas except for a very few buildings. The docks, wharf, and warehouses actually washed up on the mainland across the bay, and the entire island was flooded.
Just this year, in fact, the residents of Mustang Island let out a huge sigh of relief when Hurricane Alex (who was forecast to hit them) instead made landfall a hundred miles away. Hurricane shutters came down after the high surf, high winds and heavy rain subsided. About a half dozen tornadoes occurred within the outer rain bands from Alex, as well.
If you have a summer home in Port Aransas, or if you live there year-round, you would be well-advised to put in roll-down shutters or some other kind of hurricane shutter. Not only will rolling shutters protect your home, they may save you money, as well. Insurance companies are required to give you a discount for approved hurricane shutters. The insurer will ask for a “hurricane shutter certificate”, and if this isn’t available, your insurance agent may send someone out to take pictures and see your hurricane shutters in person. It’s as easy as that. As soon as it is verified, you will start receiving a discount on your insurance policy.
Hurricane shutters are a smart buy, all the way around. They protect your home, and they save you money on your insurance policy. And if this is a summer home that is empty in the cold of the winter, hurricane shutters can double as security shutters. Installing hurricane shutters on your home is a win-win.
