Another Beautiful, Sunny Day, Another 8-Foot High Tide Flooding Charleston SC

[hatrack]

Nothing to see here!!

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High tide pushed about a foot of water inland where Lockwood Drive and Broad Street converge on Monday, Sep. 21, 2020. Matthew Fortner/Staff


Under a perfect blue sky, Charleston began to flood. At noon Monday, the tide pushed toward the dunes. It filled the area’s rivers and marshlands. It rose higher along The Battery’s sea wall. Then, like an overfilled cup, the Atlantic poured in. By high tide, we’d set yet another 8-foot-plus tide, another high-water mark. It was among the 30 highest tides here since scientists have been keeping track. And that includes past hurricane surges.

Monday’s sunny day flood happened because of a combination of factors, and some of these are normal: The moon’s gravitational pull would have made tides higher than average no matter what. And the passing of Hurricane Sally also piled waves onto the coast. Other factors aren’t normal at all. A rapidly warming planet has accelerated rising sea levels in multiple ways. Sunny day floods like Monday’s once were rare, but seas are a foot higher now than a century ago. And in a place called the Lowcountry, every inch matters.

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Vehicles tread through flooded water at the intersection of Hagood and Line on Monday, Sept. 21, 2020 in Charleston. Andrew J. Whitaker/Staff


Charleston sits squarely in the Lowcountry and is no stranger to chaos from flooding rain storms.
But when tides pass the 7-foot mark like this, land trades places with the Atlantic whether there’s rain or not. Through the 1980s, this typically happened just five times a year — usually when a hurricane pushed waves ashore, such as Hugo, the record-holder with a 12.5-foot crest.

But last year, Charleston had a record 89 days when the water breached that 7-foot level. So far this year, we’ve had 42 flooding tides. The past week alone had 7-footers at least once every day. More brimming tides are expected this week. And they’ll get worse in the future as global sea levels increase. Already, Charleston is on a list of the eight most vulnerable cities in the United States to these forces, according to the Fourth National Climate Assessment.

And a study published Friday by University of South Carolina researchers uncovered new evidence that the city’s vulnerability is accelerating.

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https://www.postandcourier.com/rising-waters/a-sunny-day-in-charleston-and-a-flood-what-that-tells-us-about-climate-change/article_367fb068-f9b9-11ea-b881-4ff1fcafa0a9.html

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

1. I have a friend who lives in Charleston on the 7th floor

of an apartment building, so she's rather cavalier about the flooding. I don't think she fully understands that the frequent and increasing flooding will eventually make the city unlivable.

The Water Will Come: Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World by Jeff Goodell is something more people need to read.

[StClone]

2. Like any Problem

Ignore it until it takes over your life.