Climate change: Rising waters threaten North Carolina

[unhappycamper]

Sandbags protect a beach house in south Nags Head.


Climate change: Rising waters threaten North Carolina
By Bruce Henderson | Charlotte Observer
Posted on Sunday, January 16, 2011

MANNS HARBOR, N.C. — The sea that sculpted North Carolina's coast, from its arc of barrier islands to the vast, nurturing sounds, is reshaping it once again.

Water is rising three times faster on the N.C. coast than it did a century ago as warming oceans expand and land ice melts, recent research has found. It's the beginning of what a N.C. science panel expects will be a 1-meter increase by 2100.

Rising sea level is the clearest signal of climate change in North Carolina. Few places in the United States stand to be more transformed.

About 2,000 square miles of our low, flat coast, an area nearly four times the size of Mecklenburg County, is 1 meter (about 39 inches) or less above water.

At risk are more than 30,500 homes and other buildings, including some of the state's most expensive real estate. Economists say $6.9 billion in property, in just the four counties they studied, will be at risk from rising seas by late this century.

[Mist]

1. I thought it was the entire eastern seaboard. I've seen rapidly eroding

beaches on Long Island, and in South Carolina too. Trying to keep this from happening would seem to be a losing battle...

[SpiralHawk]

2. Free Clue for Freeper Carolinians: Reality does not give a shit if you ignore it

It will drown your fantasy life all the same.

Turn off that steenking Fox New RepubliCorp Propaganda channel now -- immediately -- and start dealing with truth, facts, and reality.

You will lose your Republiconism, but you will gain authentic American patriotism as you are motivated to DO SOMETHING POSITIVE for yourselves, your family, your state, your country, and your planet.

[Vinnie From Indy]

3. Amen!

Reality doesn't give a shit of you ignore it! Who knows? Maybe Rush and FOX will get their idiot listeners to blame Michael Moore and George Soros for the loss of the Outer Banks and such.

[DCKit]

4. If I had a house at Nag's Head, I'd really give a shit.

However, I do live <2 blocks from the "tidal" Potomac river, so this is a real issue.

Yearly flooding by 2020 wouldn't surprise me.

[jimlup]

5. Yeah my Dad's place in NC is 1 meter above sea level...

That means likely underwater by 2100... I wonder when property values will start to fall.

[d_r]

6. don't worry

the right wingers are planning to cause the end of the world way before 2100.

[d_r]

7. don't worry

the right wingers are planning to cause the end of the world way before 2100.

[stuntcat]

8. outer banks is one of my favorite places on earth

it's a lot of birds' favorite place too. This breaks my heart, NC is my state forever, and on one side they're flattening mountaintops to burn the coal to change the atmosphere to change the coast on the other side. Pathetic.