For more than half a century tide gauges have indicated that the Chesapeake Bay’s sea level has been rising twice as much as the global average and faster than anywhere else on the East Coast. Geologists have hypothesized that the land in this part of the country was once pushed up by a prehistoric ice sheet to the north and is now settling back down since the ice melted.
Now a new study by a group of geologists from the University of Vermont and the U.S. Geological Survey have confirmed that hypothesis through research using extensive drilling in the coastal plain of Maryland. The study concludes that, indeed, the land under the Chesapeake Bay is sinking quickly and the researchers project that Washington, D.C. could drop by six or more inches in the next century.
"This falling land will exacerbate the flooding that the nation's capital faces from rising ocean waters due to a warming climate and melting ice sheets," notes a press statement for the study, "accelerating the threat to the region's monuments, roads, wildlife refuges, and military installations."
The article contains no tips on how we can accelerate the subsidence.
The new research was conducted by a team of geologists from the University of Vermont, the U.S. Geological Survey, and other institutions. The results were presented online July 27 the journal GSA Today.
[Historical background data and information can be found at the U.S. National Geodetic Survey and the U.S. Geological Survey. - Ed.]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Thursday July 30 2015, @09:06AM
I say screw the monuments. Let the monuments of the new country be the best hospital in the world that cures cancer and helps the paralyzed walk again. How about a university that doubles the best Caltech, MIT, Stanford, etc ever were and that's totally free to attend for those who study hard and prove they can achieve. How about a city that is carbon negative, meaning they produce more renewable energy than they use and which recycles everything.
It would be sincerely refreshing to recast America as a country that exalts the commonweal instead of exercises in ego that are monuments, and that doesn't whore itself out to every POS lawyer, lobbyist, and banker that walks through the door. We've been there, we've given that the old college try, and it has failed.
Washington DC delenda est.