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Cape Hatteras National Seashore
The first national seashore, on North Carolina's eroding Outer Banks
Cape Hatteras National Seashore was the country's first, authorized by Congress in 1937 and formally established in 1953. It protects about 70 miles (110 km) of the Outer Banks across Bodie, Hatteras and Ocracoke islands, roughly 30,350 acres (123 km²) of beach, dune and marsh. Offshore, the Gulf Stream and the Labrador Current meet over the shifting Diamond Shoals, the reason these waters earned the name Graveyard of the Atlantic. Three historic lighthouses guard the coast, and loggerhead and green sea turtles nest on its beaches each summer.
These barrier islands are built to move, and the park is learning to move with them. When the black-and-white spiral Cape Hatteras Light was finished in 1870, it stood about 1,500 feet (460 m) from the ocean. By 1970 the sea was about 120 feet (37 m) away. In the summer of 1999 engineers rolled the 4,830-ton tower 2,900 feet (880 m) inland on rails, a 23-day trip, and it relit that November. At 198 feet (60 m), it is the tallest brick lighthouse in the United States.
Erosion has since moved from lighthouses to houses. Oceanfront homes in Rodanthe and Buxton now stand on the open beach, and by June 2026 the Park Service counted 32 houses that had collapsed onto seashore beaches since 2020, scattering debris for miles. Storm overwash regularly cuts N.C. Highway 12, the islands' only road, and new bridges have been built to carry it over the most vulnerable stretches.