SOUTH PADRE ISLAND--South Padre Island officials are thankful Hurricane Harvey did not cause serious damage to the island.

Just north of us, Hurricane Harvey caused mass destruction to parts of the Texas coast.

South Padre Island Police Chief Randy Smith said they were prepared for whatever harvey was going to do to the island.

"For each one of these storms, you can prepare for a certain set of circumstances, but then you have to tweak all your plans to fit the conditions because not one storm is the same," said Chief Randy Smith.

Chief Smith said first responders prepared for the worst.

"Our preparations were all called for. We know that we would have been ready if the storm would have taken a little bit more westward turn. We were just in the clear," said Smith.

He said other than strong winds and rain, there was no significant damage.

Preparations included a new emergency notification system put in place months ago, called Swift 911.

"We had a lot of people initially sign up, and of course with our hurricane stickers and swift 911 stickers, we had a lot of people signing up last minute. It was a good way to manage on who belongs on the island and how we can get notifications out to those folks," said Smith.

Nearly 3,500 people signed up for the alerts.

We saw folks taking boards off the windows and getting back to normal life.

Mike Wilcox has gone through his share of hurricanes.

"Back in Dolly, I lost this balcony and water came in like crazy, so this year, it sounded like it was going to be really bad," said Wilcox.

He and his cat Barry went to Mission to stay safe.

"We've had four evacuations since I moved down here twenty years ago, and only one hit us and that was Dolly. That's the one I stayed for. I was here during Dolly. So this time, when they were talking about it, I decided I better scadoodle," said Wilcox.

Wilcox hopes this is the last hurricane for a while.