Flood damage to North Conway Country Club from an Oct. 29 storm has forced the New Hampshire Golf Association to put next summer’s New Hampshire Amateur championship on temporary hold.

The tournament will be played in July 2018, NHGA executive director Matt Schmidt indicated in a Tuesday phone interview. It’s just a matter of where: North Conway CC administration contacted the NHGA as soon as it realized the magnitude of destruction from the storm, which dumped upwards of 5 inches of rain and produced wind gusts in the neighborhood of 60 mph around the Mount Washington Valley region.

The NHGA is actively seeking a replacement site. The association announced the decision on Monday on its website.

“At this point, we’re still pretty much exploring every option that we have on the table,” Schmidt said in a phone interview on Tuesday. “We’ve already approached a course about moving up in the timeline, and we’ve reached out to a couple of places as well. All of that stuff is on the table.”

Keene’s Bretwood Golf Course hosted this year’s state am. Portsmouth Country Club will host in 2019 but wouldn’t be likely to move up a year in the rotation because it will welcome the N.H. Women’s Golf Association state amateur next year as well, Schmidt noted.

Beyond that, the men’s amateur has sites set well into the future. Nashua Country Club is slated for 2020, North Conway would likely take 2021 to make up for losing next year, and Abenaqui Country Club in Rye is on schedule to entertain the 2022 tournament.

Given the fluid nature of the situation, an Upper Valley course, if interested, could conceivably become 2018’s emergency host. Grantham’s Eastman Golf Links took on the tournament in 2010, and Hanover Country Club has been a past host as well.

“I would be willing to help out out if (a) site is needed,” Hanover head professional Alex Kirk wrote in an email on Tuesday night. “I am not sure on the dates of the event or if they work within our current booked events. It would be an honor to host the N.H. state am.”

Eastman head professional Mark Larrabee was out of the office on Tuesday and couldn’t be reached for comment.

“I’ve heard from one president of one course who said, ‘If you guys get to a point where you have no other options, give me a call back,’ ” Schmidt said. “Everybody is aware of it. I’ve had a lot of people call and say, ‘Have you thought of this place or that place?’

“I know Eastman has been really supportive of the event, and Hanover is on the short list as a potential host site; we’ve had a good relationship with them. All options are open.”

North Conway reached out to the NHGA within days of assessing the Oct. 29 storm damage. Wind gusts hit 51 mph at Berlin Municipal Airport and 58 mph at White Mountain Regional Airport in Whitefield, according to a preliminary National Weather Service report, but Schmidt said NCCC sustained relative few downed trees.

The greatest damage to the course came from the overflowing Saco River, which wraps around the property’s west side. Schmidt said a dike that protects the course gave way and led to significant flooding on a number of holes. The NWS reported 2.31 inches of rain in the town of North Conway from the storm, while nearby Gorham received 5.13 inches and Pinkham North got 5.05 inches.

Schmidt, who visited NCCC with tournament director Greg Howell on Thursday, added that the course sustained similar damage when Tropical Storm Irene blew through in August 2011. North Conway still had a few repair projects from that storm to complete when the most recent weather system added to the list.

“If it’s one hole, the water recedes and you have one bad hole, you can deal with one hole,” Schmidt said. “When we got there and sat down with them — they had an emergency board meeting the night before … it was staggering to us, the damage that was done.

“There were tee signs knocked down from the force of water rushing in and receding. There were tree stumps and branches on the course, and we found out that flowed downriver and ended up on the course. It was pretty unbelievable when we got out there.”

The N.H. Amateur is the NHGA’s biggest event of the year, taking up six days of competition. Given the work involved in preparing for it, Schmidt wants to have a new 2018 host in place by Jan. 1.

Greg Fennell can be reached at gfennell@vnews.com or 603-727-3226.