A new study says that due to climate change, major flooding is likely to take place in New York City every 25 years rather than every 500 years.
Published Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the study found that flood level heights rose about four feet between the years 850 and 2005, primarily because of sea-level rise caused by melting ice glaciers and ice sheets and warmer water temperatures. "Sea level is rising because of climate change," one of the study's scientists, meteorologist Michael Mann, told USA Today. "But climate change also appears to be leading to larger and more intense tropical storms."
When Hurricane Sandy hit Manhattan on Oct. 30, 2012, tunnels were flooded and the storm surge — caused by the rising sea level, high tide, and the force of the storm — breached sea walls on the southern tip of the island. The report was timed to coincide with the storm's third anniversary, and Adam Sobel, a Columbia University atmospheric scientist who was not part of the study, says it adds "certainty to what we already know, which is that coastal cities around the world — including New York, but we're not the only one, nor the worst — are in trouble."
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Blue whales have gone silent and it's posing troubling questionsUnder the radar Warming oceans are the answer
-
Acid rain is back: the sequel nobody wantedUnder The Radar A 'forever chemical' in rainwater is reviving a largely forgotten environmental issue
-
Why is the world so divided over plastics?Today's Big Question UN negotiations on first global plastic treaty are at stake, as fossil fuel companies, petrostates and plastic industry work to resist a legal cap on production
-
Tuvalu is being lost to climate change. Other countries will likely follow.Under the Radar Sea level rise is putting islands underwater
-
Massive earthquake sends tsunami across PacificSpeed Read Hundreds of thousands of people in Japan and Hawaii were told to evacuate to higher ground
-
FEMA Urban Search and Rescue chief resignsSpeed Read Ken Pagurek has left the organization, citing 'chaos'
-
Melting glaciers may lead to more volcanic eruptionsUnder the radar We're in for a boom
-
Wildfires destroy historic Grand Canyon lodgeSpeed Read Dozens of structures on the North Rim have succumbed to the Dragon Bravo Fire
