Ocean City’s fall festival season started with a storm that took everything and ended with country fans dancing in the rain. In between, town crews and promoter C3 Presents had one week to put a battered beach back together.
Here’s how the two weekends played out, drawn from the Chronicle’s coverage.
The storm that took Oceans Calling
Oceans Calling was supposed to be the biggest weekend of the fall. The sold-out festival had more than 40 acts booked for Sept. 25–27 on three oceanfront stages, headlined by Dave Matthews Band, Twenty One Pilots and Mumford & Sons, with a full lineup of food vendors ready on the boardwalk.
Then an unusually early nor’easter formed off the Southeast coast on Sept. 23 and stalled. Northeast winds piled water against the Delmarva coast through tide after tide. The National Weather Service warned of two to three feet of inundation and breaking waves up to 11 feet. Gusts reached 58 mph near Bethany Beach, Delaware.
On Thursday, Sept. 24, organizers canceled Friday’s lineup and hoped to save the rest of the weekend. By Friday morning, the storm’s track had shifted west, and C3 Presents called off the entire festival. Tides, flooding and high winds had made it unsafe to keep building the site. It was the second time weather had wiped out Oceans Calling. The first festival, in 2022, was canceled ahead of Hurricane Ian.
“They made the right call on this one. There’s no way this could have taken place,” Ocean City Emergency Services Director Joe Theobald told WTOP.
The damage
Water covered St. Louis Avenue, Philadelphia Avenue south of the Route 50 bridge, and the Inlet parking lot next to the festival grounds. Bay-side streets sat under about two feet of water. Floorboards and other debris from the Oceans Calling build were seen floating near the Inlet.
The beach took the worst of it. Water breached dunes, waves cut into the dunes at 72nd Street, and a protective sand berm on the downtown beach, which one visitor described as three to four feet tall, was gone by morning. Up the coast, the storm was blamed for one death and pushed water in Atlantic City to its highest level since Hurricane Sandy. No deaths or serious injuries were reported in Ocean City.
The storm hit a beach that was already overdue for new sand. Ocean City’s last full replenishment was in the winter of 2021–22, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers normally adds sand about every four years. The Chronicle’s full damage report has more on the $27 million project to pump about 800,000 cubic yards of sand onto roughly eight miles of beach, set to run from October through Memorial Day 2027.
Some businesses made the best of the lost weekend. Buxy’s Salty Dog Saloon hosted an impromptu two-set show by Scottish singer KT Tunstall. A local T-shirt shop printed “CANCELED” across shirts made for the festival.
One week to rebuild
Country Calling was set for the same stretch of sand one week later, and the town went to work.
On Monday, Sept. 28, crews began inspecting all 10 miles of beach. Downtown, public works crews cleared sand off the boardwalk and regraded the festival grounds.
“Public works has been out here all day. Getting the sand off the boardwalk. Manicuring the beach,” Mayor Rick Meehan told WMDT. He said the town was holding a call every morning with the city manager and C3 executives to go over what work remained and where the town could help, especially with moving sand around the edges of the concert area.
By Thursday, Oct. 1, the box office was open and the festival’s website was promoting the event as happening “this weekend.” The stakes were high. Ocean City’s tourism director has said the two festivals together bring about $300 million to the town, and hotels were 79% full in August, down from 89% a year earlier.
Country Calling, Day 1: sunshine and Lainey Wilson
Country Calling opened Friday, Oct. 2, under clear skies on the regraded beach. Gates opened at noon, and music ran more than 10 hours across three stages, Boot, Scoot and Boogie, until the 11 p.m. curfew.
The Day 1 lineup ran from Australian rodeo rider Wade Forster and Canadian singer Noeline Hofmann to Belles, who recorded one of Dolly Parton’s last duets, and Oklahoma’s Kaitlin Butts. Mitchell Tenpenny and Russell Dickerson mixed in covers of Whitney Houston, the Goo Goo Dolls and more. Rascal Flatts and Dierks Bentley carried the crowd into the night.
Lainey Wilson closed with a 17-song set that ended with “4x4xU” and “Heart Like a Truck.” Travis Tritt, recovering from pneumonia, withdrew the day of the show.
“This Friday compared to last Friday is already off to a better start,” the head chef at The Dough Roller told WBOC.
Day 2: ponchos and Chris Stapleton
Saturday, Oct. 3, brought rain, wet sand and chilly temperatures. The crowd stayed anyway.
Jackson Dean took the Scoot stage in the afternoon. The Chronicle sat down with him about marriage, London and his music. Brothers Osborne, who grew up in Deale, played what they called a homecoming set. Miranda Lambert, in a ball cap and braids, called it a “bad-hair, ball-cap-wearing kind of day” as fans sang “Kerosene” back to her through the downpour. Chris Stapleton closed the festival in the rain, and at least one couple got engaged during his first songs.
Fans traded cowboy boots for Wellingtons, duck boots and bright ponchos. Some danced in the rain, and others ducked into boardwalk shops and restaurants between sets. As one Chronicle writer put it, it was “the year of Boots, Scoot and Boogie.”
What’s next
The beach work isn’t done. The Army Corps replenishment project is due to begin this fall, with three-block sections of beach closing for about three days at a time as it moves up the coast.
The music will be back in the spring. Boardwalk Rock returns to Ocean City May 15–17, 2027.
Coverage of Country Calling is sponsored by Coast2Coast RV Rentals, the Official Coverage Sponsor of the Southern Maryland Chronicle. Heading to the shore? Coast2Coast RV Rentals delivers and sets up campers across the Delmarva Peninsula, at campgrounds, private lots and festivals. Learn more at coast2coastrvrental.com or on Facebook.
