NYtimes: Flooding of Coast, Caused by Global Warming, Has Already Begun

[spanone]

and the republican party calls it a 'hoax'

NORFOLK, Va. — Huge vertical rulers are sprouting beside low spots in the streets here, so people can judge if the tidal floods that increasingly inundate their roads are too deep to drive through.

Five hundred miles down the Atlantic Coast, the only road to Tybee Island, Ga., is disappearing beneath the sea several times a year, cutting the town off from the mainland.

And another 500 miles on, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., increased tidal flooding is forcing the city to spend millions fixing battered roads and drains — and, at times, to send out giant vacuum trucks to suck saltwater off the streets.

For decades, as the global warming created by human emissions caused land ice to melt and ocean water to expand, scientists warned that the accelerating rise of the sea would eventually imperil the United States’ coastline.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/04/science/flooding-of-coast-caused-by-global-warming-has-already-begun.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=b-lede-package-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

[malaise]

1. “It’s not a hundred years off — it’s now.”

I'd banish all the fugging LIARS starting with the moron senator in Oklahoma

[spanone]

2. it's embarrassingly ignorant

[Wounded Bear]

5. Yeah, well, it's not flooding in Oklahoma...

they have other indicators.

[Overseas]

16. Exactly. I think some of those long timeline stories are another kind of distraction.

They talk about Coastal Cities Could Flood by 2100... Or by 2050 we could be inundated...

It allows the readers to put the consequences of climate change off and pretend we are not already experiencing them, even as we watch megastorms, megafires, and have locked in already an increase in temperature of 1.5° C.

[RKP5637]

3. Excellent article! Too bad so many R's in congress don't know how to read! n/t

[True Dough]

4. It's like the frog placed in cold water

and then gradually brought to a boil. It doesn't realize the danger until it's too late...

[packman]

6. Or the classic - guy falling from a skyscraper

and shouting out as he passes each floor, "I'm O.K., no problems".

[tanyev]

7. Except at this point it's more like if there were a bunch of frogs on the counter

telling the frog in the pot that he's should hop out because he's in great danger and he tells them all to shut up because they're being hysterical.

[True Dough]

20. True. The frog in the pot

is tuning out the calls of "danger, danger.'

[Brother Buzz]

22. True

California already has mitigation plans and legislation collecting dust in committee because they can't figure how to loosen the purse strings.

And ironically, nothing will happen until they have to replace that ruler with a yardstick, and they discover it will cost three the five times as much to mitigate then if they had worked on resolving it from the get-go.

[Stonepounder]

8. There's no such thing as global warming.

They had a snowball fight in Congress.

I rest my case.

[benld74]

9. Deniers will deny even as the water

Level reached their necks.

[mountain grammy]

10. Good to see something on this..

the "news" has been scarce, like it's not happening, but it is.. Quick, someone tell the Republicans.

[jtuck004]

11. For American Indians, Coping with Climate Change Is Ancient History

When Quileute Nation elder Chris Morgenroth III was growing up in La Push, Wash., first-graders spent recess at the beach, where a few miles offshore, thick beds of kelp waved underwater. Today, those kelp beds are all but gone.

In tiny Kipnuk, Alaska, flooding is eroding the banks of the river that lies close to 17-year-old Nelson Kanuk's family home. Last year, he said, 10 feet disappeared, swallowing a shoreline trail.

And in the Olympic Mountains of Washington state, Quinault Indian Nation President Fawn Sharp wonders how a glacier's retreat will affect the Quinault River's salmon. A chance helicopter flight last fall revealed no traces of Anderson Glacier, which sends cool meltwater into the river when the blueback come to spawn.

"My heart sank," Sharp said. "I can't imagine trying to explain to another generation of Quinaults how our rich blueback salmon tasted. That's a central part of who we are and that glacier keeps the waters cool and the water levels at an appropriate place. Now it's gone."
...

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/for-american-indians-coping-climate-change-ancient-history/

Wonder if there will be a place to look back at a couple hundred years from now?

[mountain grammy]

12. K & R

[spanone]

23. thanks mg

[mountain grammy]

26. You're welcome..

I posted it to facebook too. It's an important story and very under reported.

[TonyPDX]

13. Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana, Florida . . .

should all have been in the fight against climate change.

[SMC22307]

27. And NC... hope I live long enough to see what happens to the Outer Banks. (n/t)

[Botany]

14. CO2 has a weight of 44 and O2 has a weight of 32 .... CO2 has more mass so it can hold more heat

The science behind global warming/climate change is done. And yet as Island Nations that
have been around for 10,000 + years go underwater, the glaciers in Glacier National Park
melt, and Miami and Norfolk get flooded one party fights the truth so they can get money
from the fossil fuel industry.



"It's worth noting how many authors agree with the basic fact of global warming - more than nine thousand. And that's just in a single year. Now I understand as well as anyone else that consensus does not imply truth but I find it odd how there aren't even a handful of scientists who deny global warming presumably because the global warming mafia threatens to throttle them if they do. It's not like we are seeing a 70-30% split, or even a 90-10% split. No, the split is more like 99.99-0.01%."

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/the-curious-wavefunction/about-that-consensus-on-global-warming-9136-agree-one-disagrees/

[0rganism]

21. which raises the question...

what happened to the one author who rejected AGW? did he get a big bag of money from the Kochs? did he get a permanent speaking gig on Faux? enquiring minds want to know!

[MrScorpio]

15. Hence why I sold my house on the Virginia Peninsula and moved by to Michigan

Didn't feel like being underwater.

[FLPanhandle]

25. I'll be selling my home on a Florida bay in the next 5 years

Buying a sailboat. At least I'll always be above water.

[Overseas]

17. K&R. Glad to hear it. More frank coverage.

[smirkymonkey]

18. K&R

[riderinthestorm]

19. Humanity has chosen their fate. nt

[mnhtnbb]

24. In North Carolina, Republicans decided they could legislate the amount of sea rise

that would affect the NC coast. I kid you not.

Actually all they did was say science is crazy. There is virtually universal agreement among scientists that the sea will probably rise a good meter or more before the end of the century, wreaking havoc in low-lying coastal counties. So the members of the developers' lobbying group NC-20 say the sea will rise only 8 inches, because … because … well, SHUT UP, that’s because why.

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/plugged-in/nc-makes-sea-level-rise-illegal/

[spanone]

28. that 'crazy science' could cause 'crazy consequences'

they're not dumb, follow the money

[Warpy]

29. It won't be a problem until the NYSE has to close

during and after the highest tides every month.

Then the problem will be noticed to the point of moving the whole thing inland so they can ignore it some more.