Moriches Inlet ( ) is an

inlet An inlet is a typically long and narrow indentation of a shoreline such as a small arm, cove, bay, sound, fjord, lagoon or marsh, that leads to an enclosed larger body of water such as a lake, estuary, gulf or marginal sea. Overview In ...

connecting

Moriches Bay Moriches Bay ( ) is a lagoon system on the south shore of Long Island, New York (state), New York. The name Moriches comes from Meritces, a Native American who owned land on Moriches Neck. Two townships in Suffolk NY, Suffolk, New York (Brookhaven ...

and the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the ...

, in Suffolk County,

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

. The name Moriches comes from Meritces – a Native American who owned land on Moriches Neck.The Indian Place-Names on Long Island and Islands Adjacent, with Their Probably Significations. Tooker, William Wallace. pp 144-14

/ref> It forms the eastern border of Fire Island, New York, Fire Island and the western border of West Hampton Island – a

barrier island Barrier islands are a Coast#Landforms, coastal landform, a type of dune, dune system and sand island, where an area of sand has been formed by wave and tidal action parallel to the mainland coast. They usually occur in chains, consisting of an ...

on which West Hampton Dunes is located.

History

The inlet was present on Fire Island until it closed up during the 1800s. The inlet which split West Hampton from Fire Island was reformed by a

Nor'easter A nor'easter (also northeaster; see below) is a large-scale extratropical cyclone in the western North Atlantic Ocean. The name derives from the direction of the winds that blow from the northeast. Typically, such storms originate as a low ...

in 1931. The 1931 storm created a geographic quirk for the western tip of West Hampton Island, which is in the Town of Brookhaven: in order to access the western end of the island via land from Brookhaven, one must travel several miles through the Town of Southampton. Between 1933 and 1938 Moriches Inlet widened to wide and deepened with sand being deposited on both the bay and ocean. The widening subsided in 1938 when the

Great Hurricane of 1938 The 1938 New England Hurricane (also referred to as the Great Long Island - New England Hurricane and the Long Island Express) was one of the deadliest and most destructive tropical cyclones to strike the United States. The storm formed near th ...

opened up the

Shinnecock Inlet Shinnecock Inlet is the easternmost of five major inlets connecting bays to the Atlantic Ocean through the narrow Outer Barrier that stretches from New York City to Southampton, New York on the south shore of Long Island. It splits Westhampton Isl ...

further east between Shinnecock Bay and the ocean. In an attempt to stabilize the deterioration of the barrier island, local authorities built

groynes A groyne (in the U.S. groin) is a rigid aquatic structure built perpendicularly from an ocean shore (in coastal engineering) or a river bank, interrupting water flow and limiting the movement of sediment. It is usually made out of wood, concrete ...

on the inlet between 1952 and 1953. Local authorities have consistently urged for the inlet to be kept open to allow boats from the mainland of

Long Island Long Island is a densely populated continental island in southeastern New York (state), New York state, extending into the Atlantic Ocean. It constitutes a significant share of the New York metropolitan area in both population and land are ...

to have access to the ocean. The

United States Army Corps of Engineers The United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is the military engineering branch of the United States Army. A direct reporting unit (DRU), it has three primary mission areas: Engineer Regiment, military construction, and civil wo ...

took over the maintenance of the inlets and jetties in the 1980s. The Corps, in turn, ran into controversy with claims that the groynes and jetties were blocking the natural east to west

longshore drift Longshore drift from longshore current is a geological process that consists of the transportation of sediments (clay, silt, pebbles, sand, shingle, shells) along a coast parallel to the shoreline, which is dependent on the angle of incoming w ...

that replenished sand. The inlet and groynes were to be blamed for a loss of 8–10 million cubic yards of sand on Fire Island, representing a loss of of beach and a depth of 12–16 feet along the entire Fire Island beach zone. The inlet was the initial primary water access route for recovery ships following the July 17, 1996 crash of

TWA Flight 800 Trans World Airlines Flight 800 (known as TW800 or TWA800) was a regularly scheduled international passenger flight from John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, United States, to Fiumicino Airport in Rome, Italy, with a stopo ...

, which broke up in flight and crashed into the ocean about from the inlet; throughout the night of July 17–18, boats carrying human remains and aircraft debris passed from the debris field through Moriches Inlet to the East Moriches

United States Coast Guard The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and Admiralty law, law enforcement military branch, service branch of the armed forces of the United States. It is one of the country's eight Uniformed services ...

station, before recovery-vessel traffic was shifted to

( to the northeast of the debris field) on July 18, due to the latter inlet's wider, calmer waters.

References

{{coord, 40.76447, -72.754233, display=title Brookhaven, New York Fire Island, New York Inlets of New York (state) Landforms of Suffolk County, New York