Jacksonville’s beaches lost about 1.2 million cubic yards of sand to Tropical Storms Ian and Nicole, magnifying a need for shoreline renourishment that was already planned by 2024, a beach expert has concluded.

Kevin Bodge, a longtime consultant for Jacksonville’s beach restoration projects, said he assessed the losses after walking about 10 miles of coastline between Mayport and the St. Johns County line and comparing beach conditions to those mapped in surveys before this year’s storms.

“It was not a catastrophic amount of erosion by any means, but it was still a big number,” he said.

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