Tourist Development Councils in the panhandle have spent tens of millions of dollars renourishing their beaches over the last decade.

Hurricane Gustav's storm surge threatened to erase that hard work this past weekend, but the sand held its ground.

If Louisiana dodged a bullet with Gustav, then the panhandle dodged the ricochet.

"Well, after Gustav came to town there was some beach erosion, but it was really light to moderate beach erosion. Most of the sand, from talking to our beach engineers and those folks, is right off the shore, so it is already starting to build back. So, we anticipate in a very short order we'll see the beach starting to rebuild itself. So, all in all we did very well with the storm."

Gustav's storm surge on Monday at public beach access 64 in Panama City Beach caused the waves to crash well past the normal coastline. A few days later, the beach was almost back to normal.

What a difference a couple of days makes. The water line has receeded on Panama City Beach, and the nourishment project held up as it was supposed to. Panama City Beach isn't the only beach in the area that's glad Gustav's storm surge didn't do the damage that it could have.

Tracy Louthain with TDC Public Information said, "Our beaches fared very well after Gustav. We were out there the next day monitoring, surveying any damage. Again, we were very pleased with the results. Our beaches fared very well, and in some cases sand actually accumulated on the beach. We don't have some areas that have some minimal beach erosion."

The nourishment projects have held up so far, but it's still early in an already active hurricane season. Both Louthain and Rowe said they can only hope that another storm doesn't change things.