While the seas rise in the Outer Banks and elsewhere in NC, science treads water

News and Observer ^ | 3/16/14 | Bruce Siceloff

[lafroste]

RODANTHE — Coastal geologist Stan Riggs, who tracks the ups and downs of North Carolina’s shoreline, needed a bullhorn to make himself heard above a roaring nor’easter that had toyed with the Outer Banks for two days.

He climbed down from the ridge of a DOT-built dune narrowly separating N.C. 12 from the boisterous Atlantic Ocean. A bleached house named WAVE BREAKER seemed to be stilt-walking into the surf – but, really, the island itself was slipping out from under this cottage in a shrinking subdivision called Mirlo Beach.

Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2014/03/15/3702235/while-the-seas-rise-science-waits.html#storylink=cpy

[Darksheare]

Exactly.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Almost all of the coal in the midwest dips to the Southwest.

[Jim Noble]

It’s astonishing these warmers can face the public without shame and blushing

It furthers the Revolution. Why should they be ashamed?

[Democrat_media]

I don't believe anything from gov funded scientists nor news media. i live below sea level . no sea level rise. this is what affects the Earth's climate but it hasn't really changed and won't for centuries. you are talking about .5 mm or whatever. they can fudge that and is usually below the level of error. ice at poles is growing so if anything sea levels lowering not rising

[Labyrinthos]

I don’t know the answer to this problem but it is not new.

I don't even see this as a "problem." The oceans and the lands have been shiftng horzontally and vertically since the beginning of time and there is absolutely nothing that any of us can do about it.

[Cyber Liberty]

Meanwhile, New York state is uplifting. The more things change....

[MCF]

“the fountains of the great deep”
The sewers backed up.

[Citizen Soldier]

I grew up in the Va Beach area and summered in the Nags Head area and it is a known fact people have always built too close to the oceanfront up and down the coast. They compromised the sand dune lines and eventually a storm will wash away the dunes. That happened years ago in Kitty Hawk and many people lost homes and today there is not enough on the beach side of the ocean road to build.

[Jack Hydrazine]

ROFLMAO!!!

[Democrat_media]

500 feet is a change we can see.

.5 mm is not something that can be proven nor anything to be alarmed about even if true

ice at poles growing so if anything sea levels are lowering

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/5067351/Rise-of-sea-levels-is-the-greatest-lie-ever-told.html

But if there is one scientist who knows more about sea levels than anyone else in the world it is the Swedish geologist and physicist Nils-Axel Mörner, formerly chairman of the INQUA International Commission on Sea Level Change. And the uncompromising verdict of Dr Mörner, who for 35 years has been using every known scientific method to study sea levels all over the globe, is that all this talk about the sea rising is nothing but a colossal scare story.

Despite fluctuations down as well as up, “the sea is not rising,” he says. “It hasn't risen in 50 years.

[Jack Hydrazine]

Here are some articles from WUWT.

Oh say can you see modern sea level rise from a geological perspective?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/12/21/oh-say-can-you-see-modern-sea-level-rise-from-a-geological-perspective/

Observed sea level rise still is (just) within the ‘natural range’
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/12/12/observed-sea-level-rise-still-is-just-within-the-natural-range/

Intelligence and the hockey stick
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/12/08/intelligence-and-the-hockey-stick/

History falsifies climate alarmist sea level claims
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/12/02/history-falsifies-climate-alarmist-sea-level-claims/

Stefan Rahmstorf and the consensus of experts on sea level -vs- reality, reality wins
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/11/22/stefan-rahmstorf-on-sea-level-vs-reality-reality-wins/

More articles there at this link.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/tag/current-sea-level-rise/

[House Atreides]

“...The Outer Banks are mostly made up of sand and as such have been growing and receding for years. The sand is washed away then piled back up then washed away then piled back up. Same thing happens in Virginia Beach to the North. Lately the sand has been washing away and not getting piled back up.

Its not that sea levels are rising there but the currents are just washing away the sand.”
********************************************************************
Yes, barrier islands are constantly (but usually slowly over the years with periodic [e.g., during a hurricane] speedups) moving/migrating.

Build on a barrier island at your own risk and factor the fact that your “land” is not “permanent” into the cost of the land and the building.

[EEGator]

But they never say anything about the fact that nothing on Earth is a static mechanism. Temps go up, temps go down...seas rise, seas retreat...

[lafroste]

It’s called erosion.

According to other posts on this thread (thank you all so much) the sea level actually is rising, and has been since measurements started. But you are right: erosion is the real culprit on the outer banks. I also suspect that the east coast is actually subsiding due to plate tectonics. In other words it is completely out of Man's control.

[Democrat_media]

I don’t buy any of it.

500 feet is a change we can see.

.5 mm per year is not something that can be proven nor anything to be alarmed about even if true

ice at poles growing so if anything sea levels are lowering not rising

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/5067351/Rise-of-sea-levels-is-the-greatest-lie-ever-told.html

But if there is one scientist who knows more about sea levels than anyone else in the world it is the Swedish geologist and physicist Nils-Axel Mörner, formerly chairman of the INQUA International Commission on Sea Level Change. And the uncompromising verdict of Dr Mörner, who for 35 years has been using every known scientific method to study sea levels all over the globe, is that all this talk about the sea rising is nothing but a colossal scare story.

Despite fluctuations down as well as up, “the sea is not rising,” he says. “It hasn’t risen in 50 years.

[kaehurowing]

I live near the ocean and have gone jogging along the same shoreline for 35 years now. There is no rise in ocean levels. If what they were saying was true, my running path would be underwater by now.

The real problem is people are so unaware of what is going on around them outside that they believe all of this nonsense.

[Democrat_media]

next they will say that since it’s warmer in the day than at night then that’s global warming or climate change. no that’s cause the Sun is not directly lighting the Earth at that time

then at high tide they’ll claim sea levels rising

[UCANSEE2]

There are local sea level rises due to the shifting of ocean currents. If you look at a chart of the changes you can see that the rises are not at all even.

The overall global sea level hasn't changed in thousands of years. The amount of water on planet Earth hasn't changed significantly at all.

There is much more water UNDER the surface than there is above it.

[EEGator]

We could make erosion illegal...executive order.

[centurion316]

Barrier islands along the East Coast have been in motion for eons. They go in, they go out, they go up, they go down. Development might slow down the movement, or it may speed it up, but those islands they just keep on moving.