Impact: The effect of climate change on coastlines 9783035621815, 9783035621785

Table of contents :
Contents
Foreword: The songs of the alligator and the gopher tortoise
Map
Intro: The investigation
Geography
Passion
Impact
Resistance
Threat
Escape
Appendix

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Alex MacLean

The effect of climate change on coastlines 235,0 x 330,0mm

Birkhäuser Basel

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Detail of overwash fans on the barrier island that protects Mastic Beach in Shirley, New York, weeks after Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast. Overwash occurs when waves exceed the height of dunes, depositing sand inland and altering the backshore. 

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Edgartown Great Ponds are coastal ponds (classified as such by containing over 10 acres in their natural state) located on the south shore of Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts. The thin strip of barrier beach separating the ponds from the Atlantic Ocean often breaks in places and closes by itself several times a year, causing an influx of saltwater, which cools the ponds and maintains its water quality.



11 — Foreword

The songs of the alligator and the gopher tortoise 18–19 — Map

21 — Intro

The investigation Alex MacLean x 330,0mm 235,0



332 — Appendix List of places Books by Alex MacLean Acknowledgements

Geography 83 — Passion 169 — Impact 231 — Resistance 281 — Threat 321 — Escape

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Bill McKibben is an American journalist, author and environmental activist. He has devoted the greater part of his career to the environment, to global warming in particular. In 2007, he founded the NGO 350.org and won the Alternative Nobel Prize. He is the author of many best-selling books including The End of Nature, published by Anchor Books in 1989, and most recently Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?, published by St. Martin’s Press in 2019. 11

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Just as people have gotten used to eating a certain amount of food every day, they’ve gotten used to living in particular places. For obvious reasons, many of these places are right by the ocean: estuaries, where rivers meet the sea, are among the richest ecosystems on earth, and water makes for easy trade. From the earliest cities (Athens, Corinth, Rhodes) to the biggest modern metropolises (Shanghai, Mumbai), proximity to saltwater meant wealth and power. And today it means exquisite, likely fatal, vulnerability. Nowhere is this clearer than in the terrain that Alex McLean illuminates in this stunning volume about the East Coast of the United States. The easily accessible bays and deltas of the East Coast—the mouth of the Hudson, the wide and shallow Chesapeake Bay, the spectacular beaches of the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida—have some of the most valuable real estate on the planet. It is as vulnerable as almost any place on earth, but because of the wealth of the United States people don’t face the same level of risk they do along the coast of Bangladesh, or in the small island nations that may soon disappear, or in the rice fields of the Mekong Delta, which are already being poisoned by salt. Still, the situation is extremely serious. That’s why this book is so crucial—it helps you see what would otherwise be obscured. From five or six feet up—that is, from the height of our eyes—it is impossible to perceive the imperiling flatness of the East Coast. From an airplane, it’s a completely different story.

beings have raised the temperature of the earth more than one degree Celsius, and most of the increased heat has been trapped in the sea. This has had two effects: one, since warm water simply takes up more space than cold, the sea level has risen because of “thermal expansion.” And two, everything frozen has begun to melt. Some of that melt doesn’t directly raise the level of the oceans, because the ice in question sits on top of the sea. In the same way that melting the ice cubes doesn’t overflow your gin and tonic, this thawing doesn’t cause the sea to rise. But other ice—in the Arctic, the Antarctic, and mountain glaciers—sits on top of rock. When it melts, the sea level will go up. And this ice is melting. In fact, let me tell you about a trip I took not long ago, to the ice shelf of Greenland. I was with a pair of veteran ice scientists and two young poets—a woman named Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner, from the Marshall Islands in the Pacific, and another named Aka Niviana, who was born on this largest of all the earth’s islands, a massive sheet of ice that, when it melts, will raise the level of the oceans more than 20 feet.

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To understand what’s going on, you need to know a little about climate change. Throughout the Holocene (the ten-thousand-year period that began as the last Ice Age ceased, the stretch that encompasses all recorded human history), the carbon dioxide level in the atmosphere stayed stable. But beginning in the eighteenth century, the Western world began to burn coal, and then oil and gas, in ever larger quantities, a habit that has now spread to most of the planet. The combustion of fossil fuels inevitably emits carbon dioxide. Lots of it: a gallon of gas weighs eight pounds, and when you burn it, it releases more than five pounds of carbon. This has been accumulating in the atmosphere, which has seen a rise in carbon dioxide levels from 275 parts per million to more than 400 parts per million, and accelerating. So far the earth’s governments have not taken effective steps to rein in this rise. And since the molecular structure of carbon dioxide traps heat that would otherwise radiate back out to space, the temperature has begun to steadily rise. So far human

We landed at the World War II–era airstrip in Narsarsuaq and proceeded by boat through the iceberg-clogged Tunulliarfik fjord, arriving eventually at the foot of the Qaterlait glacier. We hauled gear up the sloping, icy ramp of the glacier and made camp on an outcrop of red granite bedrock just over half a mile inland. In fact, we made camp twice, because the afternoon sun swelled the stream we’d chosen for a site, and soon the tents were inundated. But after dinner, in the late Arctic sunlight, the two women donned the traditional dress of their respective homelands and hiked farther up the ice, till they could see both the ocean and the high ice. And there they performed a poem they’d composed, a cry from angry and engaged hearts about the overwhelming fact of their lives. The ice of Niviana’s homeland is disappearing, and with it a way of life. While we were on the ice sheet, researchers reported that “the oldest and thickest sea ice” in the Arctic had melted, “opening waters north of Greenland that are normally frozen even in summer.” Just up the coast from our camp, a landslide triggered by melting ice had recently set off a 100-foot tsunami that killed four people in a remote village: it was, said scientists, precisely the kind of event that will “become more frequent as the climate warms.”

The effect, however, is likely to be even more immediate on Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner’s home. The Marshalls are a meter or two above sea level, and already the “king tides” wash through living rooms and unearth graveyards. The breadfruit trees and the banana palms are wilting as saltwater intrudes on the small lens of freshwater that has supported life on the atolls for millennia. Jetnil-Kijiner was literally standing on the ice that, as it melts, will drown her home, leaving her and her countrymen with, as she put it, “only a passport to call home.” So, you can understand the quiet rage that flowed through the poem the two women had written, a poem they now shouted into a chill wind on this glacier that flowed up to the great ice sheet, silhouetted against the hemisphere’s starkest landscape. It was a fury that came from a long and bitter history: the Marshalls were the site of the atom bomb tests after the war, and Bikini Atoll remains uninhabitable, just as the United States left nuclear waste lying around the ice when it abandoned the 30 bases it had built in Greenland.

the batteries in his remote weather stations, scattered across the ice. They tell one story, but his colleague Alun Hubbard, a Welsh scientist, conceded that there were limits to what instruments could explain. “It’s just gobsmacking looking at the trauma of the landscape,” he said. “I just couldn’t register the scale of how the ice sheet had changed in my head.” But artists can register scale. They can transpose the fact of melting ice to inundated homes and bewildered lives, gauge it against long history and lost future. Science and economics have no real way to value the fact that people have lived for millennia in a certain rhythm, have eaten the food and sung the songs of certain places that are now disappearing. This is a cost only art can measure, and it makes sense that the units of that measurement are sadness and fury—and also, remarkably, hope. The women’s poem, shouted into the chill wind, ended like this:

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But, of course, climate change is different, the first crisis that, though it affects the most vulnerable first and hardest, will eventually come for us all. Let me bring my home to yours Let’s watch as Miami, New York, Shanghai, Amsterdam, London, Rio de Janeiro and Osaka Try to breathe underwater … None of us is immune. Science can tell us a good deal about this crisis. Jason Box, an American glaciologist who organized the trip, has spent the last twenty-five years journeying to Greenland. “We called this place where we are now the Eagle glacier because of its shape when we first came here five years ago,” Box said. “But now the head and the wings of the bird have melted away. I don’t know what we should call it now, but the eagle is dead.” He busied himself replacing 13

This is the same threat that faces the East Coast, where we actually possess (unlike the Marshall Islands) the political power to address the crisis—the monuments of Washington are literally vulnerable to a rising sea. But whether or not we rise up in time will depend on how well we perceive the threat, and so far the record has not been auspicious—at least in part because scientists are inherently conservative and have consistently underestimated how much the oceans would rise. In 2003, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicted that sea level would rise a mere half meter by the end of the twenty-first century, most of that coming from thermal expansion. But even as the IPCC scientists made that estimate, they cautioned that it didn’t take into account the possible melt of the great ice sheets over Greenland and Antarctica. And pretty much everything we’ve learned in the years since makes scientists think that those ice sheets are horribly vulnerable.

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The very same beasts That now decide Who should live And who should die … We demand that the world see beyond SUVs, ACs, their pre-packaged convenience Their oil-slicked dreams, beyond the belief That tomorrow will never happen

Life in all forms demands The same respect we all give to money … So each and every one of us Has to decide If we Will Rise

Since 1850, Tangier Island, Virginia, located off the coast of Chesapeake Bay, has lost 70% of its land mass to subsidence and sea level rise, and is predicted to become uninhabitable in the next 50 years. Residents of the island, which was first settled at the end of the eighteenth century, speak a dialect that is distinct from American English, an example of how sea level rise threatens our cultural landscape, in addition to physical geography.

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Paleoclimatologists, for instance, have discovered that in the distant past, sea levels often rose and fell with breathtaking speed. Fourteen thousand years ago, as the Ice Age began to loosen its grip, huge amounts of ice thawed in what researchers call meltwater pulse 1A, raising the sea level by 60 feet. Thirteen feet of that may have come in a single century. Another team found that millions of years ago, during the Pliocene, with carbon dioxide levels about where they are now, the West Antarctic Ice Sheet seems to have collapsed in as little as a hundred years. “The latest field data out of West Antarctica is kind of an OMG thing,” a federal official said in 2016—and that was before the really epochal news in the early summer of 2018, when 84 researchers from 44 institutions pooled their data and concluded that the frozen continent had lost three trillion tons of ice in the last three decades, with the rate of melt tripling since 2012. As a result, scientists are now revising their estimates steadily upward. Not half a meter of sea level rise, but a meter. Or 2 meters. “Several meters in the next 50 to 150 years,” says James Hansen, the planet’s premier climatologist, who adds that such a rise would make coastal cities “practically ungovernable.” As Jeff Goodell (who in 2017 wrote the most comprehensive book to date on sea level rise1) puts it, such a rise would “create generations of climate refugees that will make today’s Syrian war refugee crisis look like a high school drama production.”

What’s really breathtaking is how ill-prepared we are for such changes. Goodell spent months reporting in Miami Beach, which was literally built on sand dredged up from the bottom of Biscayne Bay. He managed to track down Florida’s biggest developer, Jorge Pérez, at a museum opening. Pérez was not, he insisted, worried about the rising sea because “I believe that in twenty or thirty years, someone is going to find a solution for this. If it is a problem for Miami, it will also be a problem for New York and Boston—so where are people going to go?” (He added, with Trump-level narcissism, “Besides, by that time I’ll be dead, so what does it matter?”) To the extent that we’re planning at all, it’s for the old, low predictions of a meter or less. Venice, for instance, is spending $6 billion on a series of inflatable booms to hold back storm tides. But they’re designed to stop sea level rise of about a foot. New York City is building a “U-Barrier,” a berm to protect Lower Manhattan from inundation in a storm the size of Hurricane Sandy. But as the sea level rises, winds like Sandy’s will drive far more water into Manhattan, so why not build it higher? “Because the cost goes up exponentially,” says the architect. The cost is already starting to mount. Researchers showed in 2018 that Florida homes near the flood lines were selling at a 7% discount, a figure growing over time because “sophisticated buyers” know what is coming. In fact, “sophisticated buyers” have already begun pushing longtime residents out

of some of the higher ground in Miami—little Haiti for instance. And now insurance companies are balking: basements from “New York to Mumbai” may be uninsurable by 2020, the CEO of one of Europe’s largest insurers said in 2018. That break in real estate values may finally be the factor that triggers widespread understanding—once the trillions of dollars of East Coast real estate begin to decline in value, no one is going to want to be the last person out. Real estate website Zillow predicted in 2016 that one in eight Florida homes might be underwater by 2100, a loss of more than $400 billion in that state alone. Or perhaps it will be the next storm. In the wake of Hurricane Florence, which flooded some towns for the second time in three years, people began moving—or at least talking about it. But perhaps—just perhaps—people might be able to see what is going on from photos like the ones in this book. If they do, they will understand the vulnerability of this coastline—but they will also be reminded of its incredible beauty. I got the chance, not long ago, to fulfill a boyhood dream: watching a rocket launch from Cape Canaveral on Florida’s Atlantic coast. The day before the launch, I went on a tour of the area with public affairs officer Greg Harland and ecologist Don Dankert, who had overseen the rebuilding of dunes along the shoreline of the Kennedy Space Center. I’d been warned not even to raise the topic of global warming, which was fine with me—in the age of Trump, I didn’t want to get them fired. In any event, there was no need, because the problem was blindingly obvious. We climbed up a small hill overlooking Launch Complex 39, where the Apollo missions left for the moon and where any future Mars mission would likely begin. The ocean was a few hundred yards away—which is perfect in the sense that launching rockets here on the East Coast means the earth’s spin helps put them into space, and that if something goes wrong, they fall into the sea; but not so perfect given that that sea is now rising. NASA started worrying about this sometime after the turn of the century, forming a Dune Vulnerability Team. The worry accelerated dramatically after Hurricane Sandy in 2011. Sandy didn’t hit Cape Canaveral—it hit New York City—but even at a distance of roughly a thousand miles, the great storm churned up waves strong enough to break through the barrier of dunes and very nearly swamp the launch complexes. “Dunes that had previously been relatively

stable for decades—suddenly they were gone,” said University of Florida geologist John Jaeger. And so those dunes were rebuilt. Dankert had not only found the millions of cubic yards of sand (excavated from a nearby air force base), but he himself planted the last of the 180,000 native shrubs to hold the sand in place. So far, the new dune has performed, yielding little ground in the face of recent hurricanes. So, perhaps, until a few more chunks of the Antarctic crash into the drink or a bigger storm hits head-on, our escape route to outer space is safe. But what impressed me more than the new dune was the sheer affection these two men had for the landscape where they worked. “Kennedy Space Center is the Merritt Island Wildlife Refuge,” said Harland. “We use less than 10% for our industrial purposes.”

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longest undisturbed stretch on the Atlantic Coast,” Dankert added. “We launch people into space from the middle of a wildlife refuge. That’s amazing.”

They talked for a long time about their favorite local species: the brown pelicans skimming the ocean just off the beach; the Florida scrub jays; the gopher tortoise. When they were rebuilding the dune, they carefully bucket-trapped and relocated every last one of the tortoises. Before I left, they drove me half an hour across the swamp to a pond near the Space Center headquarters building, just because they wanted to show me some alligators; we could see snouts surfacing near the bank. At each corner of the pond, a sign had been carefully placed: THE ALLIGATORS IN THIS AREA OCCUR HERE NATURALLY. THEY WERE NOT PLACED HERE AND THEY ARE NOT PETS. PUTTING ANY FOOD IN THE WATER FOR ANY REASON WILL CAUSE THEM TO BECOME ACCUSTOMED TO PEOPLE AND POSSIBLY DANGEROUS.

The sign continued:

IF THAT SHOULD HAPPEN THEY MUST BE REMOVED AND DESTROYED.

Something about that sign moved me tremendously. It would have been easy enough to poison the pond, just as it would have been easy enough to bulldoze the gopher tortoises. But NASA didn’t, because of a long series of affectionate laws that drew on an emerging understanding of who we are. John Muir, in some ways the first

self-conscious Western environmentalist, crossed Florida on his thousand-mile walk from Louisville, Kentucky, to the Gulf of Mexico in 18672, a trip he used to form his first heretical thoughts about the meaning of being human. From his diary: “The world, we are told, was made especially for man—a presumption not supported by all the facts. A numerous class of men are painfully astonished whenever they find anything, living or dead, in all God’s universe, which they cannot eat or render in some way what they call useful to themselves.”3 His proof that this self-centeredness was wrong was the alligator, numbers of which he could hear roaring in the swamp as he camped nearby, and which clearly caused man mostly trouble. But the alligator was wonderful nonetheless, Muir thought, a remarkable creature perfectly adapted to its landscape. “I have better thoughts of those alligators now that I’ve seen them at home,” he wrote. Indeed, he addressed the creatures directly: “Honorable representatives of the great saurians of an older creation, may you long enjoy your lilies and rushes, and be blessed now and then with a mouthful of terror-stricken man by way of dainty!”4 Most of us don’t go as far as Muir—we still wince when we read of some gator emerging from the water hazard on the sixth hole to chomp down on an unwary golfer—but his basic idea that all of creation matters has made some real headway.

If we realized the beauty and the fragility and the sheer meaning of this ancient coastline, perhaps we’d be moved to do something. It’s possible that it’s too late to save the most vulnerable coast—Tangier Island is shrinking fast, it’s hard to imagine that we can slow global warming in time to save Ocracoke, I wouldn’t invest in Miami Beach on a dare. But we can still slow the rise of the seas enough to save much of this place, and we can figure out how to successfully inhabit it. If we did, it would be visible from the air: huge banks of offshore wind turbines providing much of the power for the East Coast, massive arrays of solar panels in the Sunshine State (perhaps on some of what are now golf courses). Let us hope that a sequel is coming someday—that Alex MacLean, in one of the new electric-powered planes, will be able to give us a vision of humans responding to the greatest threat we’ve ever faced.

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That evening, Harland and Dankert drew me a crude map to a beach where I could wait the hours until the predawn rocket launch—a beach where they said I’d be likely to spot a loggerhead sea turtle coming ashore to lay her eggs. And so I lay on the sand, north of Patrick Air Force Base and south of the sign erected by the Brevard County Historical Commission to commemorate that, here, in 1965, Barbara Eden emerged from her bottle to greet her astronaut at the start of I Dream of Jeannie (the last sitcom filmed in black and white, and certainly a key feature of my early intellectual life). The beach was deserted, and under a near-full moon, it was easy to see a turtle trundle from the sea. She lumbered deliberately to a spot near the dune, where she used her powerful legs to excavate a pit. She spent an hour laying eggs, and even from 30 yards away, I could hear her heavy breathing in between the whisper of the waves. And then, having covered her clutch, she tracked back to the ocean, in the fashion of others like her for the last 120 million years. 16

1 Jeff Goodell, The Water Will Come. Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World, Little, Brown & Company, 2017. 2 John Muir, A Thousand-Mile Walk to the Gulf, Houghton Mifflin, 1916. 3 Ibid. 4 Ibid.

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TEXAS LOUISIANA

Hurricane Harvey August 17–September 2, 2017 Category 4 hurricane Maximum wind speed: 134 mph Confirmed damage: $125 billion Confirmed deaths: 107

MAINE

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NEW JERSEY DELAWARE MARYLAND VIRGINIA

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Hurricane Wilma October 15–25, 2005 Category 5 hurricane Maximum wind speed: 185 mph Confirmed damage: $29 billion Confirmed deaths: 87

MISSISSIPPI

SOUTH CAROLINA

ALABAMA

GEORGIA

Hurricane Sandy October 22–29, 2012 Category 3 hurricane Maximum wind speed: 115 mph Confirmed damage: $75 billion Confirmed deaths: at least 285

Hurricane Florence August 31–September 19, 2018 Category 4 hurricane Maximum wind speed: 220 km/h Confirmed damage: $45 billion Confirmed deaths: 53

FL

Hurricane Ike September 1–16, 2008 Category 4 hurricane Maximum wind speed: 148 mph Confirmed damage: $38 billion Confirmed deaths: 195

IDA OR

Hurricane Michael October 6–15, 2018 Category 5 hurricane Maximum wind speed: 161 mph Confirmed damage: $25 billion Confirmed deaths: 74

Hurricane Katrina August 23–31, 2005 Category 5 hurricane Maximum wind speed: 174 mph Confirmed damage: $108 billion Confirmed deaths: 1,836 Hurricane Irma August 30–September 14, 2017 Category 5 hurricane Maximum wind speed: 185 mph Confirmed damage: $77 billion Confirmed deaths: 134

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The investigation Alex MacLean

For forty-five years, I have been flying small planes, photographing natural and constructed environments, and for the last fifteen of these, I have striven to draw attention to the reality of the climate crisis and its likely causes. I have extensively documented suburban areas and sought to capture the scale of urban sprawl and the monofunctional zones built after World War II: shopping malls and business parks connected to each other by a system of endless roads and highways. I have studied the different modes of intensive agriculture and the excessive use of carbon-based products, which clearly reveal our lack of respect for the soil that nourishes us. But I have also photographed promising new practices in urban design and planning that will both improve community life and reduce carbon emissions. When I started out forty-five years ago, I barely thought about the environmental aspect of my work, but in many ways, by photographing the patterns of the American landscape and accumulating perspectives that can’t be seen at ground level, I have spent my life capturing the key aspects of climate change. I realized that I had been interested in agriculture long before I understood how it was deeply connected to climatic upheavals. I had always been drawn to romantic rural landscapes and the esthetics of the patterns generated by traditional farming methods, both as a photographer and as a pilot. I realize that intimate knowledge of these landscapes is of great help to me as I seek to highlight the significant impact of carbon emissions caused by intensive livestock farming, the use of chemicals and fertilizers to grow crops and the oxidation of soils caused by excessive tillage. Similarly, my previous knowledge of large forested areas has given me a better understanding of the impact of extracting and transporting energy resources, such as the large-scale exploitation of the oil sands in Alberta. The scale of this mining and refining operation, made possible at the cost of stripping huge swaths of Canada’s boreal forest, is almost inaccessible to the eye except from an airplane.

Using aerial photography to show phenomena that are difficult to understand in both form and scale can also be a strategy for conveying positive values such as resilience or flexibility and how they can be used to mitigate the climate crisis. For example, I spent a lot of time exploring the rooftops of New York City to highlight the untapped potential of outdoor roof space—30% of the city’s surface—to cool the air temperature and save energy by increasing the number of reflective white roofs and solar roof collectors. This study also featured many examples of alternative green roofs planted with a wide variety of plant species to insulate homes. These are functional outdoor living spaces that make the city much more pleasant to live in. My main objective, and my challenge, in photographing subjects relating to climate change is to use the narrative power of images to raise awareness of the reality of the crisis and to alert people to the direction we are moving in. My intention is not to frighten, rather to show why we need to act individually and collectively. Over time, climate change will reconfigure the Earth’s surface, leaving spectacular traces of floods, erosion, dry soils, desertification and the ash left by forest fires. Most people think of these events as anomalies from which the Earth can recover, but the models at work that can be seen from an airplane prove otherwise. There is no denying that global warming is melting the polar ice caps and, furthermore, that this is the cause of the thermal expansion of ocean waters. Sea level rise is a universal problem that gives us an insight into what future climate disruption awaits if we do not take serious action. Nonetheless, it is difficult to make people understand this phenomenon through images because the sea is rising at an imperceptible median rate of a few fractions of an inch per year, even if, as all assessments now show, this rate will only increase. Future impacts are more likely to be understood if we look at the effects that are already perceptible today and imagine them

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This photograph of Toms River, New Jersey, was taken while returning north after a week of photographing the coast of Virginia. Many of my favorite images wind up being taken on my way to or from the intended destination, which speaks to the exploratory nature of aerial photography. The end-of-the-day light was perfect for highlighting the density of housing on the coast, and the extent to which barrier islands line New Jersey’s shore. 

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worsening over time: for example, erosion the salinization of freshwater systems—already causing the death of shoreline trees and vegetation—or flooding during the high tides of spring. Another way to convey the impact of sea level rise on the coastline through images is to show what has already been done to mitigate, or counter, the effects that are already tangible. From the sky, we can take in the scale of the defense structures (seawalls, breakwaters, etc.) financed from public funds to safeguard infrastructure, as well as the work of private owners to preserve their homes and their way of life. In fact, what we see is the very illustration of the real disaster, since almost all these efforts are temporary solutions. The most effective strategies will be long-term measures: preserving natural zones, such as wetlands and marshes, in order to mitigate the effects of storm surges; using oyster beds to attenuate waves; and building and planting sand dunes to strengthen the coastline. All of these measures fall into the category of resilient solutions, which are increasingly present along the coast. In my estimation, the project was at the right scale for me, even though I had set an ambitious goal: to explore and study in detail the coastline in its continuity from Maine to Florida, and thereafter the Gulf Coast from Florida to Texas. I had already flown over these coasts 22

separately many times in recent years, but I had never considered flying over them as a continuum, in a narrative approach. On a first test flight, although I was due to fly over Central Park, I followed the coastline as closely as possible from Boston to New York. I then realized the difference between what I had imagined as the coastline—where the open sea meets the land—and the reality of the vast coastal zone, which extends from where the depth of the ocean floor begins to produce coastal waves and from there continues inland, to the point where bodies of water connected to the ocean—estuaries, marshes and rivers—are no longer affected by the tides. This exploratory flight quickly changed my understanding of the scope of the mission I had set myself and made me realize how the impact of sea level rise is being felt all through this vast coastal zone that extends well beyond the shores of the mid-Atlantic states. As a result, the greater part of my investigation would turn out to be well inland, which would increase the length of my trips tenfold. So while I was in fact flying along the coasts, most of the time it was over cities and urban areas, far back from what is strictly speaking the coastline. Despite the highly visible and dramatic signs of the rapid rise in sea levels, one of the conclusions I came to during my reconnaissance flights is that it is difficult for people to conceptualize sea level because it is an

As I crossed New York City’s often crowded airspace, the traffic controller flew me at 5,000 feet, a higher altitude than I usually fly at, but one that brings perspective to the fragility of the narrow barrier dunes of Fire Island, New York, off the southern coast of Long Island.

235,0 x 330,0mm incongruous reality for them. How can people understand that a recreational lifestyle, one that emphasizes leisure and escape, contributes to a process that simultaneously alters this lifestyle profoundly. In essence, it is almost impossible for people to understand that their attraction to the ocean, this kind of sacred pilgrimage we make to the coast, is causing its disappearance. A carbon tax will probably be necessary to help us better visualize and calculate the impact of our lifestyles on the climate crisis. Most of the studies presented here have been carried out in geographical segments, which provides an interesting perspective on the transition of natural and cultural features from north to south. Although it takes the form of a factual report because of the wealth of information it provides on sea level rise, the book is also a historical narrative that documents regional diversity along the coasts from Maine to Texas before the effects of sea level rise materialized and changed the profile of the shoreline.

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Stretching 32 miles along Long Island’s southern coast, Fire Island, New York, is the larger island’s first line of defense. In 2012, Hurricane Sandy ravaged Fire Island in three locations. Two of the breaches were filled, but the third, known as the Wilderness Breach, remained open, dividing the island into two parts. The boat and its wake in the west channel give the scale of the breach and the submerged sandbanks.

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Geography From north to south, the East Coast of the United States offers a contrasting geography. The continental climate zone of New England stretches from Maine to the New Jersey coast, then gives way to a subtropical climate from Virginia to the Texas coast in the Gulf of Mexico. The northern part and the offshore islands are largely composed of rocky outcrops left behind by retreating glaciers and are subject to erosion. Moving further south, the coast has the appearance of a low-lying coastal plain that slopes gently down into the shallow waters of the continental shelf. This configuration has given rise to a succession of long, sandy barrier islands, separated from the mainland by bays, estuaries and lagoons that support rich ecosystems. These islands are migrating to the mainland due to ocean rise, which has the effect of shrinking territory while the population 235,0 x 330,0mm is growing. MAINE Brunswick Vinalhaven Island MASSACHUSET TS Cape Cod Chatham Eastham Martha’s Vineyard Nantucket Island NEW YORK STATE Gardiner’s Island NEW JERSEY Barnegat Bay Beach Haven MARYLAND Berlin Chincoteague Bay VIRGINIA Metompkin Bay Ocean City Smith Island Tangier Island NORTH CAROLINA Lea-Hutaff Island Lighthouse Island Portsmouth Island

LOUISIANA Plaquemines Parish TEXAS Matagorda 27

FLORIDA St. George Island St. Vincent Island Waccasassa Bay

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SOUTH CAROLINA Cape San Roman Edisto Island Saint Helena Island

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Gardiner’s Island, New York, is the one of the largest private islands on the East Coast. The long, narrow northern end of the island was created by currents that pushed sand from farther upshore, showing the fluidity of movement on sandy shorelines.

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The turbulence of flowing water in the Androscoggin River near Brunswick, Maine, shapes and reshapes the river bottom into irregular underwater dunes and valleys.

When flying over a landscape, the keys to understanding lie in the morphology of the land, the nature of the soil and, of course, the climate. These factors, the basic components of geography, have shaped landscapes over the millennia. In years to come, coastal landscapes will be the most vulnerable to flooding due to a combination of long-term natural factors and powerful, one-off weather events, for example a severe storm lasting barely a day. In geological times, the sea level fluctuated during ice ages. Although it has been relatively stable over the past 2,000 years, 15,000 years ago it was about 300 feet lower than it is today. Over the past 100 years, the sea level has begun to rise significantly due to the influx of warmer seawater and water from melting ice sheets. In the future, sea level rise will not be linear—a tiny rise on one coastline can lead to disproportionate flooding over large areas of low-lying land. Much of the New England coastline has been worn down to bedrock. From Maine to Massachusetts, the coastline is deeply marked by the disappearance of glaciers that covered much of North America. As the glaciers retreated northward, they left behind moraines of earth and a mass of sediment that originally formed, for example, the Cape Cod Peninsula, the islands of Martha’s Vineyard, Nantucket and Long Island. From southern Maine to Florida and along the Gulf Coast states, the shoreline is bordered by a succession of barrier islands—very narrow sand ridges that generally run parallel to the mainland and protect the coast from storms and erosion. These natural barriers shelter huge expanses of wetlands, deltas, estuaries, but also marshes that mitigate the impact of storm surges. However, while these barrier islands and their associated mainland water bodies protect the coast, they are far from stable. Frequent breaches create inlets that mix the waters of the ocean with those of the mainland. Huge quantities of sand are displaced during high and low tides, and also during storms. It is understood that barrier islands will migrate towards the shore, just as a beach does when waters rise. If this happens, the question is whether the growth and life of the wetlands and marshes will endure and resist drowning. The threat to endangered wetlands is already palpable in the Mississippi Delta as it enters the Gulf of Mexico due to the cumulative effect of incidences of land subsidence, which are often attributable to human presence. The land beneath the sea is subsiding, and the marsh and reed areas are on the verge of disappearing. These losses are easy to visualize when I locate them on my navigational charts, whereas they are no longer visible in reality. Sea level, which serves as a universal reference point as well as a datum for my altimeter setting, is not as absolute as people think. It fluctuates along different coasts and with different ocean currents, such as the Gulf Stream, which slows down the flow to the Carolina coast. The coastline’s back-and-forth movements are also sensitive in terms of height. Some coastal areas are still rising, millennia after being freed from the weight of glaciers. Conversely, much of Chesapeake Bay is

collapsing as a result of the excessive extraction of oil resources. As the oceans continue to rise, new weather conditions and increasingly powerful storms will reconfigure the shape of the coastline. The resilience effect of the old morphological structures will provide a certain degree of stability for some time to come, but as the succession of former shorelines plainly visible inland clearly demonstrates, coastlines are constantly shifting. There is no need for us to accelerate this process. Alex MacLean

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Vinalhaven Island, Maine, along with much of northern New England, has a rocky coast that was shaped by glaciers scraping away nearly all of the earthen material down to bedrock, and then washed clean at the shoreline by waves.

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Sand bars have formed as a result of flood tides in Chatham Inlet, Massachusetts. As the tide comes in, it pushes sand inland between the breach in the barrier islands and into the lagoon.

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A sailboat cuts under Mordecai Island in Beach Haven, New Jersey, which lies inside a lagoon separating the mainland from barrier islands. Beginning in the 1930s, canals were dug into salt marshes to facilitate boating, triggering an erosion phenomenon that split the island into two parts in the early 2000s.

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Waves break on shifting sand bars off Coast Guard Beach in Eastham, Massachusetts. Sand bars provide a degree of protection to ocean-facing beaches, but can wash away with the ebb tides or move dramatically during storms.

A bay-side peninsula in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod, shows the evolving process of coastal formations. Currents cause the longshore drifting of sediments and sands to accumulate on a slender tentacle moving out into the bay. These sediments have joined two more substantiated land masses with evolving marsh lands on the back side of the beaches.

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The outer bluffs of Cape Cod and the Aquinnah Cliffs on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, bear witness to the last glacial age, some ten thousand years ago. Long considered stable, steady erosion cuts rills into the soft sediment, diverting runoff into the ocean. Sea level rise, and the frequency and intensity of storms, accelerate the process.

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Flying over the East Coast reveals the geological formation processes that continue to shape the shoreline. Beach ridges and different stages of maturing vegetation seen on Costaka Beach on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, are the footprints of old shorelines, where waves pushed sand to form patterns that trace an old coast. The sediment arrives in waves, stabilizing over time.

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Scars from Open Marsh Water Management, a technique once used for mosquito control, mark the wetlands of Barnegat Township, New Jersey. Small canals and ponds were dug into marshes to trap mosquito larvae, which were eaten by killifish brought in with high tides and trapped in the ponds when the tide went out. Although no longer used, the practice continues to weaken marshes, leaving holes in their foundations and providing more surface area for erosion.

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Detail of the previous image. Scars from Open Marsh Water Management dot the wetlands of Barnegat Township, New Jersey. The practice lessened the reliance on pesticides for mosquito control, but left marshes in a precarious state, unable to serve as a natural defense against sea level rise.

A breach in a barrier island creates a passage connecting Great Bay to the Atlantic Ocean in Beach Haven, New Jersey. Sand, pushed from the tips of where the island has been split in two, collects sand behind the cut, where calm waters allow it to settle.

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10,0mm Detail of the protective barrier island system south of Ocean City, Maryland. One can see the transition from beach to dune to marsh, each of which serves as a distinct line of defense to the mainland coast. 

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A colony of grey seals lie at the water’s edge on barrier islands off the coast of Chatham, Massachusetts. The islands, made of shifting sand, are prone to moving and washing out during large storms.

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Marsh islands inside lagoons, such as the ones in Berlin, Maryland, are often flooded with saltwater. The water, which can only escape by evaporation, creates hyper-salinated environments that kill vegetation, as indicated by darkened areas.

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Sediment has built up in the shallow, brackish waters of Chincoteague Bay, Maryland, in between Assateague Island and the Delmarva Peninsula. The region is a rich feeding ground that lies at a crossroads of migratory routes and the islets are home to many bird species. 

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Barrier islands line the lower Delmarva Peninsula, Virgina, located on the state’s eastern shore and separated from the mainland by marshy wetlands. Circulation throughout the lagoons is driven by tidal currents, which pass between the islands, raising and lowering water levels. 

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The tip of Cape Charles, Virginia, has moved south, creating new shorelines that are marked by bands of trees. The shifting sand dune system has been recorded to move as much as 30 feet per year, requiring the lighthouse to be reconstructed in safer locations on three occasions since 1828. 

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The southern end of Tangier Island, Virginia, is about to separate from the rest of the island due to shifting sand, subsidence and sea level rise. The island has lost more than 70% of its landmass since 1850, and is predicted to become uninhabitable in the next half century. 

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Beach cottages in the bottom left foreground give scale to Portsmouth Island, North Carolina, which stretches towards Ocracoke Island. This is the typical cross section of a barrier island configuration, with beach, dunes, and a back shore that faces inland.

Ocean storms have flattened the crest of the dunes on the northern tip of Portsmouth Island, North Carolina, pushing sand inland towards the side of the island facing the mainland. 

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Sand has been washed into the lagoon between Edisto Island, South Carolina, and the mainland. The line of vegetation between the beach and the lagoon is the beginning buildup of stabilizing dune vegetation. 

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Lea-Hutaff Island, North Carolina, is an uninhabited barrier island located off the coast north of Wilmington. Sand overwashes into the adjacent lagoon, creating a new base for the island’s evolving dunes. 

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Two ridges of a maritime forest converge in the wetlands of Lighthouse Island, South Carolina. This configuration of trees is known as a maritime hammock, occurring when narrow bands of forest take root on the back dunes of barrier islands.

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Mudflats at low tide in the lagoon between Saint Helena Island, South Carolina, and the mainland, an intertidal zone that is above water level at low tide and underwater at high tide. These lagoons provide a buffer for sea level rise and storm surges, though oftentimes at the cost of their habitats and protective functions. 

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Inland wetlands in Cape Romain National Wildlife Refuge, South Carolina, accumulate sand along the seaward edge, facing a coastal inlet.

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Well-defined beach ridges are separated by salt ponds on St. Vincent Island, Florida, a barrier island on the Gulf Coast. Beach ridges are the footprint of historic coastlines, left behind by new sand building up and widening the beach in front.

Detail of St. George Island, Florida.

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Roughly two-thirds of the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico, stretching from Florida to Texas, is protected by unstable barrier islands characterized by their shifting sands. Cape St. George, an uninhabitable barrier island off the coast of the Florida panhandle, was split from the larger St. George Island, Florida, by a hurricane in 1837.

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A tidal stream winds through the Waccasassa Bay State Preserve, Florida, accessible only by boat. The estuarine river is a habitat for both salt- and freshwater fish.

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The Mississippi River flows into the Gulf of Mexico at Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana. Since 1900, Louisiana has lost more than 1 million acres of marshland due to erosion, exacerbated by sea level rise, dredging, and subsidence. The Louisiana coastline is now losing about 50 square miles of marshland per year.

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The barrier island of Matagorda, Texas, separates the ocean from Matagorda Bay, offering protection to the mainland. Sand is transported down the coast by longshore drift, which occurs as waves strike the beach at an angle, carrying sand up the beach and pulling it down again.

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People’s enthusiasm for the seafront drives economic growth and the development of coastal land, running counter to the idea that the coastline offers limited scope for expansion. In reality, island towns offer less opportunity for growth than inland cities, but are much more densely populated. The higher the added value—scenic and recreational—attached to a coastal area, the higher the population density. Resort towns, which were built to provide easy access to beaches, are in fact satellite developments of inland areas. They have developed on the long, narrow barrier islands, linked to the mainland by bridges. Whereas all factors point to an intensification of coastal settlement, the densest population clusters will be among the most vulnerable to the impact of sea level rise and its effects, namely more powerful and more frequent storms. 235,0 x 330,0mm

MAINE Biddeford Pool MASSACHUSET TS Chatham Cohasset Marblehead Marshfield Newburyport North Truro Peggotty Beach RHODE ISLAND Matunuck Rockport Westerly Salisbury Scituate NEW YORK STATE Long Island NEW JERSEY Atlantic City Avalon Beach Haven West Lavallette MARYLAND Berlin Little Egg Ocean City Long Branch Longport Mantoloking NORTH CAROLINA Davis Ocean City Nags Head Seaside Heights North Topsail Beach South Seaside Park Ocean Isle Beach Toms River Rodanthe

TEXAS Bay City Port O’Connor 83

SOUTH CAROLINA Hilton Head Little River FLORIDA Haulover Sandbar Myrtle Beach Key Largo Pea Island Laguna Beach Panama City Port St. Joe Sunny Isles Beach

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Paddleboarders and boaters gather on a sand bar after low tide off the coast of Newburyport, Massachusetts.  

Once lined with houses and businesses, Misquamicut Beach in Westerly, Rhode Island, was flattened by hurricanes three times in the twentieth century before the land was condemned and designated as a state beach.

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Viewing the coast from an aerial perspective brings into focus the energy-intensive culture of leisure that persists in the face of sea level rise. Beachgoers in Berlin, Maryland, have parked their SUVs as close as possible to the water’s edge. 

For many people, living near the ocean is a vital necessity. A kind of primitive reflex, as if the sea were the origin of our being. Everyone experiences a phenomenon of identification with the primal sounds of the beach, from the crash of breaking waves to the smell of the salty air and the wonder of looking out over an open horizon. The ocean is a link that unites us to time and connects us to the other shores of the world. The attraction of the ocean is subtle but decisive, it is part of our unconscious. I always have this sensation when I fly over people wandering along a beach or stretching out on the sand to sunbathe, or when I fly over the bays between the mainland and the barrier islands during the summer months. Often I feel like getting away from my isolated cockpit for a pit stop on the waterfront. There is much irony in the fact that this population, so attracted by the benefits of the coast, seems so little inclined to consider the effects of the climate crisis. All along the coast—a hotspot of American leisure activity— people are playing with the deteriorating climate, without making the connection between their lifestyle and the consequences it may entail. Seen from the sky, there are few signs that people on the coast are taking action to limit consumption or reduce carbon emissions. Solar and wind installations are rare. The coastline offers a showcase of wealth and all forms of excess: large houses facing the ocean with their private swimming pools; boats equipped with up to three 300-hp outboard engines; luxury coaches lined up on the beach. The examples of opulence are plain to see. In many ways, United States coastal life is reminiscent of an air conditioner turned up to max with the windows wide open. The coexistence of a yearning for the coast and a disregard for the climate is glaringly obvious throughout urban development and the population density. Beach culture is linked to the presence and attractiveness of the hundreds of barrier islands, these natural islands of sand that form an almost unbroken chain along the East Coast and, to a lesser extent, along the Gulf of Mexico. The seaside towns that have become established there, close to the beaches, stretch for miles without interruption, one next to the other. It all inspires a sense of imminent disaster. Construction patterns along the coasts are highly varied, in keeping with the American fever for real estate, which is not new. Many of the developments set in the middle of lagoons were carried out in the 1960s and 1970s, and thus predate the current awareness of the importance and environmental value of wetland ecosystems. The injunction to “drain the swamp” has been around for a long time. Nevertheless, these developments are still tolerated, benefiting from new building permits and infrastructure upgrades—all funded in part by local, state and federal governments. Social disparities are also very pronounced in these settings, as they are throughout the United States. The rich and the poor share the land unequally according to their income and how desirable it is. Large sections of the East Coast shoreline have been privatized and have seen the construction of family

homes and apartment buildings that cut off public access to the beach. The recognition of sea level rise by the general public will only come when the wealthiest parts of society tone down their enthusiasm for the ocean and move away from the shoreline and its dangers. For some of these owners, living by the sea is not only a source of physical danger, but also a source of increased anxiety that their properties will be destroyed by shoreline erosion. Family cottages are dangerously built too low, with waves at their door. As for properties perched above the ocean on seemingly safe sites, they are actually being undermined by erosion. When one realizes how precarious the buildings are, regardless of their position, one can sense the owners’ unease about the inevitable and one wonders how long their anxious struggle will last, left to be decided by events they hope won’t transpire but most likely will. Alex MacLean

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People move back and forth between the beach and an adjacent sand bar in North Truro, Massachusetts. 

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Speed boats and jet skis flock to Haulover Sandbar, a popular offshore destination north of Miami, Florida, where people can congregate and wade in the shallows. 

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Luxury yachts and high-power speed boats with multiple outboard engines raft together at an end-of-summer music festival in Newburyport, Massachusetts. 

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Random paths through the dunes in Laguna Beach, Florida, provide access to the water, but destabilize the thin strip of shoreline that buffers the road. The footpaths expose sand to wind erosion and destroy vegetation, which weakens the dunes’ resistance to bank erosion.

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Sport fishers tailgate in pick-up trucks and SUVs on a beach designated for car access in Davis, North Carolina.

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10,0mm The Ocean Lakes Family Campground, located south of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, is the largest of its kind on the East Coast, with over 850 campsites and 2,500 lease sites on 300 waterfront acres.

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Over one million people visit the Salisbury Beach State Reservation in Salisbury, Massachusetts, each year. The barrier island is slowly migrating towards the marsh, and the beach will eventually consume the campground, which is already sheltered by a 1,600-foot-long protective wall.

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A narrow strip of land in Biddeford Pool, Maine, is inundated by frequent flooding. With projected sea level rise, road access will soon be cut off on a monthly basis due to spring tides. 

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Houses built on a sand spit in Marshfield, Massachusetts, sit tenuously between the ocean and an estuary.

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Sand separating homes on Peggotty Beach in Scituate, Massachusetts, from the ocean is slowly disappearing, as is access to the main roads. After major storms in 1978 and 1991, FEMA launched a buyout program, purchasing and destroying over twenty homes.

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A house in Scituate, Massachusetts, lies close to the ocean after years of shoreline erosion. Despite hurricanes and winter Nor’easters, which bring high waves and driving snow, a desire to live so close to the water continues to be a way of life for many. 

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Houses in Nags Head, North Carolina, are raised on stilts as a defense from flooding. As beaches have slipped away due to erosion, residences that once stood on stable ground are now randomly scattered in the surf zone. 

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Waves hit the coast of Bay City, Texas, where beachfront homes have been built in a VE zone, characterized by FEMA as coastal high hazard areas, subject to high velocity waters. We are quick to take note of the above ground homes, public roads, and utilities at risk, but buried septic systems and other hidden infrastructure further complicate life in flood zones and pose environmental risks.

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A partially constructed housing development is built around an artificial waterfront in Port O’Connor, Texas, and linked to the Gulf of Mexico via the Intracoastal Waterway, which runs along the Atlantic and Gulf Coasts. 

10,0mm It becomes starkly apparent how income inequality manifests in the landscape while flying over the coast. In Rodanthe, North Carolina, wealthier residents have built large homes close to the ocean, blocking views and shoreline access to residents who settled there earlier with more modest homes and trailers.

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The contrast between the natural morphology of Island Beach State Park on the Barnegat Peninsula, New Jersey, and the adjacent town of South Seaside Park is striking. Buildings on the margins of protective dunes put the natural environment at risk of erosion and the built environment at risk of flooding. 

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Roy Carpenter’s Beach is a community of summer cottages with a quarter mile of private waterfront in Matunuck, Rhode Island. Since the houses were built in the last half century, the beach has steadily eroded. At the time the photograph was taken, plans were underway to move homes closest to the water further inland.

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Beachfront homes and clubs in Long Branch, New Jersey, were badly damaged by Hurricane Sandy in 2012 (above image). Owners who repaired their properties subsequently benefited from public subsidies designated for the restoration of beaches (2018, below). 

Houses in the gated community of Folly Creek on Pea Island, near Charleston, South Carolina, are elevated for flood protection, with garages on ground level. Community docks provide access to the ocean, out through the lagoon. 

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Mariner’s Point condominiums in Little River, South Carolina, are built close to sea level on an artificial waterway cut into a lagoon on the Intracoastal Waterway, near the popular resort town of Myrtle Beach. 

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The precarious position of homes built between the dunes and marshes on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, is heightened by the detail that they are accessible by wooden ramps that span wetland habitats. 

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The landscaping of a home in Rockport, Massachusetts, shows the sharp divide between natural and built ocean side environments, and the privatization of the coast.

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An oceanfront home in Marblehead, Massachusetts, is built high above the water on a protective rock wall, with a private jetty for waterfront access. 

10,0mm Mansions in a wealthy enclave of Marblehead, Massachusetts, are situated on a stable granite outcrop, further protected by individual seawalls.

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10,0mm A contemporary home is situated between shoreline rock outcrops in Cohasset, Massachusetts.

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Despite a history of flooding and storm damage, and the increasing risk of both, construction of new homes, now built higher on stilt pilings, continues on artificial keys built in the lagoons of Toms River, New Jersey. 

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The Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey, one of the first leisure sites built on the Jersey Shore, partially collapsed into the Atlantic Ocean when it was hit by a storm surge during Hurricane Sandy in 2012. The northern end of the pier, pictured here, was rebuilt in 2013.

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A detail of homes on a cut-and-fill lagoon key in Lavallette, New Jersey, shows how some homeowners are willing to risk the hazards of living feet from the ocean on a dead-end peninsula in exchange for waterfront access.

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Chadwick Beach Island in Lavallette, New Jersey (right), is comprised of cut-and-fill lagoon keys in Barnegat Bay, which lies in between the mainland and the densely developed Barnegat Peninsula barrier strip. Access is reliant on Route 35, two one-way traffic lanes that run along the coast. 

The rapid development of cut-and-fill lagoon keys, such as those in Mantoloking, New Jersey, has led to public health and safety crises due to failure to accommodate coastal emergencies. Evacuation plans were not put into place until after Hurricane Sandy in 2012, which damaged most homes, now rebuilt. 

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Development has forced a New York City-like grid system onto the lagoon behind Ocean Isle Beach, North Carolina, maximizing real estate value by building as many homes as possible on waterfront lots with access to the ocean through the Intracoastal Waterway. 

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The Mystic Island neighborhood of Little Egg Harbor Township, New Jersey, is built on cut and fill in wetlands. If sea level rise continues as predicted, Mystic Island and similar wetland developments will become uninhabitable due to persistent flooding. 

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The subdivision of Beach Haven West, in Stafford Township, New Jersey, was carved out of a salt marsh, beginning in the 1950s. The New Jersey Freshwater Wetlands Protection Act prevented further development of marshes, but not before many of these rich habitat areas were dredged for coastal living.

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North Key Largo, Florida, is a luxury resort community with golf courses and a private airport lying precariously close to sea level. Dikes and seawalls will not be effective in protecting homes and infrastructure because the porous underlying limestone of Florida’s southern coast means the ocean would seep under and around them. 

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The John F. Kennedy Bridge and the Ocean City-Longport Bridge, New Jersey, connect densely populated barrier island towns, giving perspective to the challenge of evacuating residents to the mainland in weather-related emergencies.

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Ocean City, New Jersey, is built on a shifting barrier island, indicated by migrating sands on the northern tip, visible in the image. The eroding beach, which is routinely replenished, poses a structural threat to the Ocean City-Longport Bridge. 

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Dunes provide critical protection from waves for homes in Avalon, New Jersey, located on Seven Mile Beach, a barrier island that is between four and five city blocks wide. 

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Ocean City, Maryland, is situated on a 5-mile-long barrier spit. A jetty on the southernmost tip prevents sand from migrating into the inner coastal bays.

Casinos and resorts line the shore of Atlantic City, New Jersey. The city has made a concerted effort to restore and stabilize the dunes between the boardwalk and the ocean to protect against flooding. The dunes are stabilized using controlled crossover paths, sand fencing, grass planting and drainage features.

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Long Beach, New York, is situated on one of the outer barrier islands that offer protection to Long Island’s southern shore. Despite damage from Hurricane Sandy in 2012 estimated at $200 million, residents have protested against building protective dunes on the ocean side of the boardwalk, favoring uninterrupted views of wide, flat beaches. 

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Trump Tower (in the foreground) and neighboring high-rise buildings cast shadows over the sand in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, a city north of Miami. Many of the shore front dunes have been encroached upon, so they no longer serve as a natural buffer against storm surges and rising tides. 

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Panama City, Florida, is known for unique white sandy beaches, but a construction boom in the early 2000s changed access to the waterfront. High-rise buildings have first-floor parking garages to buffer against floodwaters, a risk that is now amplified by receding beaches and rising sea levels.

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After Hurricane Florence swept away the beach in North Topsail Beach, North Carolina, in 2018, condominium units, buffered by sandbags, sat feet from the waterline. The city replenished the beach with dredged sand from the channel between the barrier island and the mainland and has used sediments from a local mine to restore dunes.

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The Pinnacle Port condominium complex in Panama City, Florida, was built in the 1970s on a narrow strip of sand between the ocean and Powell Lake (bottom right). Dunes have moved inland on both sides of the buildings, leaving them more exposed on the beach to coastal erosion and storms. 

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Impact The frequency of storms and hurricanes has exposed the sheer ineffectiveness of the means implemented to mitigate the hazards of climate change. It has also raised the awareness of the public, which is sometimes reluctant to acknowledge how devastating the effects of high winds and storm surges actually are. Finally, it has forced public authorities—and, to a lesser extent, individuals—to weigh the colossal costs of repairing the damage caused and the trauma experienced by some people who, years after the devastation, are still not rehoused. All this is happening before the sea level rises, which will amplify the phenomena. Its impact is visible now on certain islands or island chains that are already submerged, and in natural areas whose soils are degraded by salinization. Yet this awareness is still relative and will continue to be so until the mass of destruction paralyzes the 235,0 x 330,0mm financial engine.

NEW YORK STATE Fire Island Queens Shirley NEW JERSEY Monmouth Beach Ocean County Sea Bright Seaside Heights VIRGINIA Chincoteague Island Tangier Island NORTH CAROLINA Topsail Beach

SOUTH CAROLINA Capers Island Edisto Island

TEXAS Bolivar Peninsula Copano Bay Galveston Rockport 169

FLORIDA Mexico Beach Port St. Joe

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A house on Ocean Beach on Fire Island, New York, was pushed off of its foundation by Hurricane Sandy. Fire Island, which stretches parallel along Long Island’s southern shore, is the larger island’s first line of defense from storms coming off the Atlantic Ocean.

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Overwash fans from Hurricane Sandy splay across the beach in Shirley, New York. The impact of storms on barrier islands shows how up and down the East Coast, these formations absorb energy from storms, serving as integral buffers between the ocean and the mainland.

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The built-out lagoon of Tuckerton, New Jersey, suffered extensive damage from Hurricane Sandy in 2012. Waterfront homeowners seek access to the ocean, but docks and boats strewn about from the storm show that coastal living can come at a cost.

Even though they have yet to be hit by the real impact of rising water levels, many of the natural landscapes along the coasts are already destabilized. In low-lying coastal areas, it is plain to see that the simple action of the tides, during the phases of full and new moon, or during equinoxes, aggravates the submersion processes being caused by erosion or excessive activity in coastal areas. Relatively new phenomena of seawater infiltration into freshwater aquifers or severe exposure to sea spray aerosol during heavy storms are killing coastal vegetation and weakening forests close to the ocean. This is often the result of a chain of subtle events that are not necessarily easy to discern. For example, the forests of Chincoteague Island, Virginia, have succumbed to an infestation of beetles, which began to thrive due to the trees’ lack of defense. The weakening of their root systems by saltwater intrusion represents a kind of plant stress. As for the residents of the island, they are learning to live next to ghost forests. Recent storms and hurricanes have become much more powerful. They capture more moisture, their winds are stronger and their diameters are expanding. Some precipitation indices have been revised upwards recently and are now measured in feet rather than in inches. Storm surges raising sea levels by 20 feet in places have been recorded, with relentless currents and waves blocking river discharge and forcing them to overflow and flood inland. The traces of these events remain present for a long time in the landscape. On barrier islands, sand overwash caused by storms leaves gaps still visible months later. Layers of sand invade dunes and lagoons, forming a thick mud in marshes. Calculations of shoreline movement indicate that on average a storm causes the same erosion that would have taken over three to four years in the natural process. Some more alarmist analyses calculate that in certain places the shoreline movements that have taken place would have taken almost fifteen years naturally. In inhabited areas, the impacted zones are highly visible from the air. They can be spotted easily thanks to the expanses of roofs covered with blue tarpaulins and the accumulation of household debris piled up in the streets. Many of the houses along the shoreline have collapsed, toppling from their pile foundations, or simply floating away. Swimming pools have filled with sand. Utility poles for public services have been thrown to the ground, just like the trees. From a distance, it is difficult to accurately assess the extent of the damage, as well as the cost of the cleanup and the time it will take. I was surprised, flying over the Gulf Coast two years after Katrina, to see how much of the damage caused by the hurricane was still visible. Great stretches of land remained empty where once there had been busy neighborhoods. Business areas, which had only been partially destroyed, remained closed. The cleanup was still in progress. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was still providing accommodation for homeless families two years after the tragedy. There are varying degrees of damage. The Bolivar Peninsula, a sandy island northeast of Galveston, Texas, was devastated by

Hurricane Ike in September 2008. Streets were destroyed and buried under the sand. Virtually no trace of vegetation or previous habitat remained, except for a very small number of houses, evidently built to more rigorous technical standards. With hindsight, one realizes the importance of building standards to ensure greater resilience to the volatility of life near the coast. But what you don’t see from the air are the personal consequences for individuals: waterlogged family furniture, unusable appliances, destroyed cribs or family photo albums. The reality of the damage is palpable in the black mold growing on the few sturdy walls, a clear sign that the surrounding air is contaminated and full of bacteria. From the viewpoint of the plane, the extent of the abandonment from one neighborhood to another is clearly visible. New dumps have been specially opened to gather up the debris and vast areas have been transformed into parking lots to hold abandoned vehicles. One easily understands that the losses run into billions of dollars. Now that we are aware of the recurrence of such situations, we can measure the long-term macroeconomic responses even as they fail to provide immediate relief on the sites. Alex MacLean

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Residents of Sea Bright, New Jersey, tear out flood-damaged materials from their homes after Hurricane Sandy. A less obvious consequence of flood damage is mold. While superficially untouched, these houses can be long-term health risks to their residents, who may inhale spores for years from even minor flooding.

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The Rockaway Peninsula, which is part of Queens, New York, sits between Brooklyn and the Atlantic Ocean. Oceanfront apartments were devastated by Hurricane Sandy’s winds and waves in 2012. Flooding can block roadway access to the peninsula, leaving residents cut off from receiving outside help.

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A backhoe removes debris in Monmouth Beach, New Jersey, following Hurricane Sandy. The remnants of destroyed homes are piled next to a swimming pool filled with sand.

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Hurricane Sandy smashed into Seaside Heights, New Jersey, in 2012, ripping out its iconic wooden boardwalk and tossing its roller coaster into the Atlantic Ocean. Images of the devastated Jersey Shore pier came to symbolize the storm’s impact in the months and years after.

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The Jet Star roller coaster, made of steel, was torn from Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey, and thrown into the Atlantic Ocean when Hurricane Sandy hit in 2012.

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Houses and buildings on the Gulf side of US Highway 98 in Mexico Beach, Florida, were obliterated by Hurricane Michael on October 10th, 2018. Most of the debris from the category 5 hurricane has been removed, months later leaving a patchwork of on-grade foundations.

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The El Governor Motel on US Highway 98 in Mexico Beach, Florida, survived Hurricane Michael, but it is surrounded by a graveyard of on-grade foundations, where homes once stood. Six months after the category 5 storm with winds as high as 160 miles per hour, El Governor remained closed indefinitely. 

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Debris is cleared from the barrier island of North Topsail Beach, North Carolina, following Hurricane Florence. Even homes that remain standing deal with significant impact from the storm, such as the eroding beach and damage from mold.

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The ocean has moved shoreward from erosion and longshore drift on the barrier island of North Topsail Beach, North Carolina, leaving houses in precarious positions. Following Hurricane Florence, sandbags were piled on the beach, a temporary and expensive solution to protect shoreline properties. 

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Varying states of destruction to a row of beach homes in Port St. Joe, Florida, struck by Hurricane Michael in October 2018, demonstrate the compounded damage from wind and water that occurs after a breach in the building’s exterior.

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Hurricane Ike obliterated the shoreline of Crystal Beach, Texas, on the Bolivar Peninsula and the surrounding Galveston area in 2008. The category 4 hurricane caused many casualties in the area due to difficulties evacuating and bringing help to the communities on the peninsula and Galveston Island.

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US Highway 87 and a municipal water drum in Crystal Beach, Texas, survived Hurricane Ike, but side streets and other infrastructure were buried in sand from overwash.

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Looking across the Bolivar Peninsula from the coast to the mainland, entire blocks were decimated by Hurricane Ike, with inland flooding occurring due to storm surge and erosion. The few homes that remained standing in Crystal Beach, Texas, were built to stronger building codes.

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Shoreline erosion from Hurricane Ike brought the ocean to the edge of a street on the Bolivar Peninsula, Texas. The loss of roadways and other infrastructure made recovery of the area difficult. Today, homes have been rebuilt atop many of the pilings and concrete floors pictured here, despite erosion of the dunes and beach rendering them more vulnerable than they were prior to Ike. 

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The Fun Spot Water Slide, situated on an artificial hill, survived Hurricane Ike’s storm surge and flooding in an otherwise destroyed neighborhood on the Bolivar Peninsula, Texas.

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Industrial ventilation tubes are installed in a beachfront hotel in Galveston Bay, Texas, in an attempt to save it from mold damage. Many of the buildings that survived the initial impact of Hurricane Ike were deemed irreparable and later dismantled. 

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Homes in Holiday Beach, Texas, were destroyed by Hurricane Harvey in 2017. The shoreline edge of properties and seawalls was swallowed by Copano Bay.  

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Property lines are blurred by hurricanes, which have no regard for where they blow houses, boats, and other assets. A boat and jet ski lie beached on the patio of a home in Brick Township, New Jersey, following Hurricane Sandy.

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Racks storing boats at a private marina in Rockport, Texas, collapsed during Hurricane Harvey. The devastation of nearby homes was amplified by the fact that stricter building codes, measures taken to regulate construction in flood zones, were not enforced until 2016.

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Tarps cover the roofs of homes in Rockport, Texas, that were damaged by Hurricane Harvey. Over a month after the storm hit, debris still lined the streets.

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Key Allegro, a canal community, is built on a mud flat in Rockport, Texas. The mainland is accessible by a single road and bridge, eliminating the possibility for fast evacuation.

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Weeks after Hurricane Harvey hit Holiday Beach, Texas, piles of debris from homes and piers lined the recently cleared road to be taken away to disposal sites.

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Tangier Island, Virginia, located in the middle of the immense Chesapeake Bay, is predicted to become uninhabitable by 2050 due to rising sea levels, eroding shorelines, and subsidence. It will be one of many established communities scattered by the ravages of climate change.

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Tangier Island, Virginia, is a complex of five separate islands, including, in addition to Tangier, Goose, Fox, Watts, and Uppards Islands, remnants of a peninsula that stretched from the east coast of Maryland into the waters from Virginia. Despite significant infrastructure projects that have been implemented and proposed, it is likely that no action will save the island from being overtaken by the sea in the next half century.

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Ghost forests such as this one on Chincoteague Island, Virginia, dot the shorelines of the Chesapeake Bay, a result of sea level rise causing saltwater infiltration into the groundwater supply, which kills trees that rely on freshwater and makes them more susceptible to insect infestations and disease.

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A progression of dead and dying trees is evidence of continuous erosion and saltwater infiltration on Capers Island, South Carolina.

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Dead trees line the beach in front of the ghost forests of Edisto Island, South Carolina.

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Resistance In response to storm surges and rising water levels, resistance is being organized both privately and publicly. Individuals, depending on their level of resources, may be able to rectify the situation on their own. They may also benefit from public assistance. Many preventive programs receive grants from the federal government, which offers assistance under certain conditions, such as raising the height of the home. It remains to be seen how far public authorities will go, specifically how high a sea level rise they will be willing to anticipate in their planning and how much money cities will commit to defense strategies. Some cities are building levees, replenishing their beaches with sand or building protective dunes. But there are still many questions. One of these is how to avoid having public funds used to solve the same problem several times over. 235,0 x 330,0mm

MASSACHUSET TS Chappaquiddick Island Nantucket Island New Bedford Scituate NEW YORK STATE Long Island NEW JERSEY Atlantic City Brick Deal Margate City MARYLAND Swampscott Ocean County Seaside Heights Wildwood Crest VIRGINIA Cape Charles Chincoteague Island

NORTH CAROLINA Holden Beach North Topsail Beach

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Loads of sand are trucked to North Topsail Beach, North Carolina, to replenish the coast for structures like this park building, which was left without any protection from the ocean after Hurricane Florence swept away the beach in 2018. 

Waves crash against the end of a seawall in Scituate, Massachusetts, a town on the south shore of Massachusetts. Part of the seawall that surrounds the town was built in the first half of the twentieth century, and is in dire need of repair.

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Scituate, Massachusetts, which has been battered by historic Nor’easters, has a double line of defense with a rip rap wall placed in front of an earlier concrete seawall to protect threatened shoreline homes.

To speak of resilience in relation to sea level rise is inappropriate as it implies a return to a state of normal in what is an irreversible process. Sea level rise could be reversed, but it would take the equivalent of an ice age—at very least, an extremely long period of time. At best, the effects of this rise can be mitigated in the more or less short term through strategies of adaptation and resistance aimed at limiting immediate impacts, shoreline erosion and saltwater flooding. Three measures, or a combination of the three, could enable us to adapt and build resilience to sea level rise. One is to build barriers and levees to prevent water from rising, which is not always possible—for example, when seawater meets porous limestone it seeps under the wall. The second is to raise houses and infrastructure, which offers protection, but only partially. The third option, finally, is to totally evacuate the risk areas and displace buildings to higher ground, further inland. When I fly parallel to the shoreline, attempts to build resilience to sea level rise are clearly visible, but these are short-term solutions with unintended consequences. For example, many homeowners and coastal communities are strengthening their shorelines with breakwaters, levees or jetties. But concrete and stone surfaces intensify erosion. Crashing on hard surfaces greatly increases the wave’s force, taking sand with them and moving it out to sea. Another solution is to rebuild and widen beaches by replenishing them with sand from bays or offshore. These programs are extremely expensive, as they require powerful dredges to extract the sand from the ocean floor and bring it ashore with connecting pipes. Once on site, the sand is spread using bulldozers. These beach nourishment programs are usually undertaken by the wealthiest seaside towns, whose economies are mainly beach-dependent. But this is a short-term solution, as the sand is either washed out to sea or carried by the waves to the benefit of a nearby town. These programs often receive federal subsidies to promote tourism, even though the process has to be repeated every two to five years. The common factor in government programs to limit sea level rise is that private interest groups, particularly those in the real estate sector, or wealthy property owners, often benefit disproportionately from these programs. Most of the solutions are beyond the reach of individuals and require public assistance programs at the county, state or federal level. Public funds therefore often protect wealthy homeowners, those who have built seafront residences with breathtaking views. They are also the beneficiaries of beach restoration programs, as sand is spread directly in front of their homes. Sea level rise is therefore a complex problem to solve, as it requires considerations of time and availability of resources. For example, the town of Key Largo, in southern Florida, decided to raise its roads, which were six inches above sea level, to twelve inches, whereas the sea could rise by eight feet by the end of the century. The decision not to go higher seems strange. But it turned out that gaining a few inches, which in any case would not

change anything, would more than double the cost of the work. These public programs are merely stop-gap measures and at best represent a step toward awareness. The use of natural systems is undoubtedly the most effective strategy. Many coastal towns build and plant dunes parallel to the beach, imitating its natural profile from the surf zone to the natural dunes. These artificial dunes are stabilized by planting and passages are provided so as not to trample the vegetation. Protecting marshes and wetlands, which mitigate wave action and reduce shoreline erosion, can also reduce damage from storm surges. A strategy of building artificial reefs for oyster and mussel culture is beginning to be implemented along the coast and in bays. These reefs have the advantage of naturally increasing in volume and boosting the resilience of the ecosystem. At the end of the day, given the reality we are facing and in light of the lack of convincing solutions to protect ourselves from the threats of rising sea levels, it seems preferable to recognize climate change as an emergency and an imminent crisis, and to do everything possible to rethink our lifestyles. This would certainly be less dangerous, less costly and much more appealing than continuing to live without changing our habits. Alex MacLean

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Rip rap is commonly used to harden the shoreline and buffer buildings, like these homes in Swampscott, Massachusetts, from the ocean. However, it inadvertently leads to beach erosion in the long run: waves hit the stones and ricochet off them, stripping away sand in the process.

Swampscott, Massachusetts.

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Scituate, Massachusetts.

Rip rap is used to protect oceanfront homes in Scituate, Massachusetts, from succumbing to the encroaching ocean. The stone walls harden the shoreline, but hasten the erosion of beaches, solving one problem while creating another.

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Fire Island is the largest of the four barrier islands parallel to the south shore of Long Island, New York, facing the Atlantic Ocean. In anticipation of Hurricane Sandy, properties such as this beachfront home were fortified with sandbags to lessen the storm’s impact.

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An 8,000-square-foot house in Chappaquiddick, Massachusetts, on the island of Martha’s Vineyard is moved inland, away from its precarious perch on an eroding bluff.

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Beachfront homeowners on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, prevent erosion with wooden cribs that dampen the impact of wind and waves.

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Following storms in the first half of the twentieth century, New Bedford, Massachusetts, began construction of a 3.5-mile dike in the form of a 20-foot-high rock wall in 1962. The wall was designed to protect against a 16-foot storm surge, equivalent to a category 3 storm. If sea level rises one to two feet, the wall will no longer be able to withstand such weather events.

New Bedford, Massachusetts. The rise of the oceans will have repercussions on most of the towns and villages bordering the East Coast. Planning studies have already been undertaken to anticipate the necessary codes of conduct in order to reassure, in the medium and long term, the holders of investments facing a likely impact. Rising sea levels will jeopardize infrastructure often located on land adjacent to the ocean, such as wastewater treatment plants, power plants, landing areas and airports. Cities such as Providence, Rhode Island, and New Bedford, Massachusetts, have already built their protective dikes. The question that arises is how high the cities will be willing to anticipate the height of the sea level in their planning. The strategies will vary depending on the strength of their economy, but also on their geography. For example, cities in South Florida are built on porous limestone that allows water to infiltrate under any type of barrier.

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Seaside Heights, New Jersey. Sand nourishment is a process used to restore beaches eroded by hurricanes or tropical cyclones. Thousands of cubic meters of sand are needed to replenish the beach, widening it if necessary to help fight shoreline erosion. Specially designed boats draw sediment from the bottom of the ocean and transport it to shore using flexible hoses that connect to each other to make them look like a big umbilical cord. The sand then gushes out onto the beach and is extended by bulldozers. Seaside Heights, New Jersey, has been working since 2013 on a project to restore its torn coasts after Hurricane Sandy. The cost is estimated at over $500 million. Given the enormity of the sums involved, this work can only be imagined in regions that generate significant seaside tourist revenues. Once rehabilitated, the beach regains its strengths, but this is only temporary because it will not withstand the future rise in sea level and the next waves of strong storms.

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Since 2013, Seaside Heights, New Jersey, has pumped offshore sand through pipes to widen its beaches damaged by Hurricane Sandy, at a cost of $500 million. Sand nourishment programs are a temporary solution to a long-term problem of shoreline beach erosion, primarily used in areas that generate high tourist revenue and tax dollars to justify the cost.

An artificial dune is constructed and planted in between the road and the beach in Wildwood, New Jersey, as a measure of stabilizing the shoreline and reducing the impact of future storm surges. Designated footpaths are used to control pedestrian traffic that otherwise might trample planted vegetation.

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An artificial barrier dune stretching the length of the beach in Mantoloking, New Jersey, is in various stages of planting dune grasses that will put down roots and stabilize the sand.

Sand nourishment that was applied to the north end of the beach in Wildwood, New Jersey, (top of picture) has been pushed down the beach by waves and longshore currents, causing the southern end of the beach to balloon in size. The channels carved in the beach mark how much it has widened; the landward ends indicate the outfall of street drains, which once lay at the water’s edge. 

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Atlantic City, New Jersey.

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Meeting demands of taxpayers while implementing best shoreline practices can be a difficult exercise. The construction of high artificial dunes that put down strong root systems is one of the best solutions to protect against storm surges and erosion. However, property owners and tourists are unhappy with obstructed ocean views and designated access points that protect both the dunes and wildlife.

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10,0mm Walkovers cut through artificial dunes in Margate City, New Jersey, providing access from the boardwalk to the beach as well as erosion control.

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As artificial barrier dunes are created in Margate City, New Jersey, walkways are mapped out to prevent the trampling of grasses that stabilize sand and prevent erosion from wind and waves.

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10,0mm Barriers of rock and metal, known as groins, are used to prevent sand from longshore drift in Deal, New Jersey. While the upcurrent side of the groin accumulates sand, the downcurrent side erodes.

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Following Hurricane Sandy in 2012, sand was regraded away from the shoreline to slow erosion and create an artificial barrier dune for future high tide and surge protection in Brick, New Jersey.

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Using public money, excavators replenish sand and widen the beach in front of a Deal, New Jersey, home, which sold for close to $20 million in 2018.

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Dunes in North Topsail Beach, North Carolina, are restored after Hurricane Florence battered homes and washed sand away. After waiting years for federal funding, the town poured millions of dollars into restoring the coast.

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As Sconset Bluff on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, steadily erodes, some homeowners pick up buildings and move them landwards, an example of how the impact of rising oceans can be felt high above sea level.

Residents of Siasconset on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, have chosen to fight erosion, rather than retreat. One technique for this is to change the angle of the cliff to increase its stability. The angle at which the cliff becomes stable depends on the type of rock, the geological structure, and the average strength of the waves.

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Rows of geotubes are stacked at the base of Sconset Bluff on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts. The oversized sandbags slow erosion at the base of the embankment, which can be seen where the vegetation has crumbled from the slope.

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Walkovers span dunes in Holden Beach, North Carolina, providing beach access to homeowners while protecting vegetation from random foot traffic.

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Beach cusps are an unintended consequence of the offshore breakwaters that were built to protect the shoreline from erosion in Cape Charles, Virginia. 

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Beach cusps form behind stone breakwaters in Cape Charles, Virginia. Further offshore, oyster beds dampen waves, combining a living shoreline approach to protecting the coast with the more traditional strategy of hardening the beach.

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Boats in Cape Charles, Virginia, float between oyster trays and a stone breakwater, two methods that are used to prevent shoreline erosion. 

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Blocks made of oyster shells and concrete are used as scaffolding for oyster reefs in Chincoteague, Virginia. Shellfish are part of the living shoreline approach to coastal resilience; seeding “castles” with larvae can protect the shore the same way breakwaters can, with lesser impact. Unlike seawalls and breakwaters, however, living shorelines grow over time, enabling them to keep pace with sea level rise.

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Concrete ships built during World War II steel shortages were repurposed and partially sunk in 1948 to serve as a breakwater for the Cape Charles, Virginia, ferry port. The ferry no longer runs, but the ships continue to shelter the pier and shoreline.

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Threat Sea level rise will affect the coast far beyond the line of the shore. The territory at risk includes all wetlands (estuaries, bays, inland seas) subject to tidal movement. Repercussions will be felt in all coastal towns as well as in economic zones located far inland. Sea level rise will disrupt low-lying infrastructure: sewage treatment plants, oil, coal or atomic power stations, storage areas, and airports, often located on low land adjacent to the ocean. Another consequence of rising water levels is the possible submersion of outdated and highly polluting industries, which are closed and often left abandoned without being dismantled. The federal government has established new building regulations and standards for the development of coastal infrastructure, however, they mostly benefit the interests of climate change deniers. 235,0 x 330,0mm

NEW HAMPSHIRE Seabrook MASSACHUSET TS Boston Everett CONNECTICUT Bridgeport Groton Norwalk NEW YORK STATE NEW JERSEY Cape May County Egg Harbor Township Elizabeth Linden Ocean City

Brooklyn, New York Fort Salonga Manhattan, New York Queens, New York

VIRGINIA Newport News Norfolk Portsmouth SOUTH CAROLINA Charleston North Charleston

LOUISIANA Cameron Parish

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Boston, Massachusetts, is sheltered by peninsulas to the north and south and by outer islands seen in the distance. The convergence of three rivers, the Chelsea River, the Mystic River and the Charles River, gives the port extended shoreline frontage, but leaves it more vulnerable to sea level rise and storm surges.

A sediment retention basin is situated in the wetlands of Ocean City, New Jersey. The basin is used to de-water and temporarily store the accumulation of sediment, a product of dredging to maintain navigation channels inside the lagoon.

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The West Rock Paper Mill’s wastewater clarification and aeration tanks in North Charleston, South Carolina, sit in a tidal zone at the very edge of the banks of the Cooper River, a tidal river that flows into Charleston Harbor.

When one looks at a small-scale map of the East Coast of the United States and the Gulf Coast, one tends to think of the coastline as the place where the blue of the ocean meets the brown of the land. This coastline measures about 2,000 miles from Maine to Florida, and 1,600 miles from western Florida to Texas. But these measurements can be calculated in different ways: the length of the coast changes according to the scale that is used, something scientists refer to as the coastline paradox. This paradox highlights the fractal dimension of the coastline, which makes its measurement impractical. To better understand the coast, one should view it as a broad sweeping zone that begins on the ocean floor and extends inland up to the point where tides and storm surges cease to impact. Adopting this standpoint, many sources suggest that the tidal coastline is in the range of 28,500 miles for the East Coast and 17,000 miles for the Gulf Coast. The extended measurement includes all parts of the shoreline, whose intricacy quickly became clear to me during my first few hundred miles of flying over coastal areas, which are made up of barrier islands, lagoons, bays, inlets and rivers. The coastal zone is therefore much more extensive than most people imagine. Taking into account the vast scope of the zone affected by the tides broadens our understanding of how vulnerable the coastline actually is while exponentially increasing the cost of dealing with the impact of sea level rise on all low-lying coastal infrastructure, such as oil depots, nuclear and thermal power plants, refineries, coal storage sites, container ports or industrial rail networks. From the ground, it is easy to forget that the consequences will be felt in cities located far inland, such as Wilmington, Delaware or Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, even though the latter is situated more than 60 miles from the Delaware Bay, where the river that borders the city flows into the ocean. Huge investments in public infrastructure are already being made to support urban development and economies in regions likely to be disrupted. This means assessing the safety of highways, bridges, public transport and waterways. When taking photographs for this project, I used landmarks that I am familiar with as a pilot: airports dotted along the coast. They were all built on low-lying, flat, open spaces, barely above sea level. The same goes for those in New York City, or for Boston’s Logan Airport. Protecting these facilities that are vital to the economy will involve enormous expense. A great deal of energy infrastructure has also been deliberately built at low altitudes and close to the coast. Thermal power plants are dependent on the sea in two ways: they receive their fuel by sea and they use seawater to cool their turbines and to discharge heated water. Sewage treatment plants have also been built at low altitudes to reduce the cost of gravity pumping and to take advantage of their location near the ocean to discharge their wastewater. One can imagine that in the future the shoreline will be protected by levees and barriers, that land will be raised with huge structures, or even that some activities will retreat to higher ground. But the disposal of hazardous wastes and of materials that cannot be transported will

present an additional challenge. The dilemma now is how to plan for future coastal development and how to adapt to uncertain predictions—an uncertainty due to our inability to project the volumes of our gas and heat emissions. Alex MacLean

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The Deer Island sewage treatment plant is situated close to sea level in Boston, Massachusetts, in order to take advantage of gravity and avoid pumping costs. After wastewater is treated and separated from solids, it is discharged 9.5 miles off shore into the Atlantic Ocean through a pipe 24 feet in diameter.

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The Consolidated Edison thermal power plant, located close to the East River on Manhattan Island, New York, supplies electricity, gas and steam to over three million New Yorkers. After it was flooded and temporarily closed due to storm surge from Hurricane Sandy, it was surrounded by a one-story dike.

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Newtown Creek, an industrial canal in Brooklyn, New York, extends the city’s tidal line into the Greenpoint neighborhood. It reveals the extent of the coastal zone and the amount of infrastructure vulnerable to sea level rise, including the petroleum refinery and wastewater treatment plant on the left bank, and the rail lines and industry on the right bank.

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Airports in major cities are often situated close to the water because of the availability of wide, flat ground along the coast. The John F. Kennedy International Airport, located on Jamaica Bay in Queens, New York, was flooded during Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

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The Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth, Virginia, a United States naval base on the banks of the Elizabeth River Estuary, raised its docks after facing continuous disruption from nuisance flooding that often occurs when the moon’s orbit is closest to Earth.

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The top of the chimney of the B. L. England Generating Station on the Great Egg Harbor River in Cape May County, New Jersey, resembles a lighthouse for navigation. The coal-fired power plant—which was charged with violating the Clean Air Act in 2006—was the last of its kind to be shut down in New Jersey in 2019. 

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The NRG Harbor Power Plant in Norwalk, Connecticut, on the Long Island Sound. Power plants were typically located along the coast to take advantage of ocean water as a cooling source. In the foreground is the outfall canal for cooling water. The power plant was deactivated in 2013 due to difficult market conditions for oil-fired plants in the face of natural gas competition.

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The Northport Power Station in Fort Salonga, New York, is the largest oil-fired power plant on the East Coast. Located on the north shore of Long Island, the power plant is located as close to sea level as possible in order to reduce pumping costs. The plant is permitted to draw over 900 million gallons of water from the Long Island Sound every day to cool its turbines, which has a major impact on microorganisms and aquatic life. 

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The Bridgeport Harbor Generating Station in Bridgeport, Connecticut, is the state’s last coal fire plant. It is scheduled to be closed in 2021 and replaced with a natural gas facility.

The St. Louis Express docks at the North Charleston Terminal on the Cooper River, 14 miles from the ocean entrance to the harbor in Charleston, North Carolina. In addition to sea level rise, infrastructure is threatened by coastal subsidence in the region.

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Coal is offloaded from rail cars to storage piles at the Kinder Morgan Bulk Terminals in Newport News, Virginia, before it is loaded onto ships. These two terminals processed over 25 million tons of coal in 2018. Coal is one of the dirtiest fossil fuels and is the largest overall contributor to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by humans, a driving force behind sea level rise.

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The Lambert’s Point Coal Terminal in Norfolk, Virginia, is the largest transloading facility in the northern hemisphere. Rail cars are directly offloaded onto conveyors that load coal directly onto waiting ships. It is also the fastest, offloading as many as 1,200 cars per day for foreign export.

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The Amtrak line connecting Boston to New York cuts through Sixpenny Swamp in Groton, Connecticut. If the rail line is breached by a storm surge and flooding, it will break the rail connection for coastal cities in the Northeast.

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Seabrook Station, a nuclear power plant in Seabrook, New Hampshire, sits at the edge of coastal wetlands and generates approximately 40% of the state’s electricity. Nuclear plants are built in low-lying coastal areas in order to pump cooling water needed for heat discharge.

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The Atlantic County Utilities Authority Wastewater Treatment Facility is a regional wastewater treatment and recycling plant in Egg Harbor Township, New Jersey, across from Atlantic City. Energy is in part produced from on-site windmills and solar panels. A fiberglass-reinforced polymer sheet piling seawall set eleven feet above sea level was constructed in the event of a “weather event” disruption. 

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The Plum Island Wastewater Treatment Plant sits in a tidal marshland near Charleston, South Carolina. Flooding can overwhelm the plant’s capacity, causing fecal bacteria to contaminate the water.

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The Sabine Pass LNG Terminal stretches across the coast of Cameron Parish Lagoon, Louisiana. It is the world’s largest LNG terminal with a daily trading capacity of 100 million cubic meters and a storage capacity of 500 million cubic meters, and is now a leading exporter of shale gas. 

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Escape

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A passion for the ocean is very much about escaping the stress of our daily lives. One of the functions of the little-used bridges that lead us to the beautiful islands along the coast is to allow us to participate in this fantasy. Escaping, not having to worry about the future, being, living in the present moment ... Until an emergency strikes and reality comes back with a bang: we will soon be overwhelmed by an ocean storm, the weather forecasters warn. We must flee in the opposite direction, facing the possibility of death. The only way out is the same bridge that brought us here. Now converted to one-way traffic, the bridge is congested, and panic ensues. This could serve as an illustration of our behavior in response to the climate emergency. As if we were simply waiting for disaster to strike before collectively coming to a consensus and finding the will to reduce our carbon 235,0 x 330,0mm emissions to zero.

VIRGINIA Hampton Roads

NORTH CAROLINA Morehead City Nags Head SOUTH CAROLINA Mount Pleasant

LOUISIANA New Orleans

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The Atlantic Beach-Morehead City Bridge, North Carolina, spans the Bogue Sound, connecting Bogue Banks to the mainland. Development of the low-lying 21-mile-long barrier island has compromised dunes and vegetation that once served as a natural defense.

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The Isle of Palms Connector Bridge stretches across 2 miles of shoreline lagoons and the Intracoastal Waterway, seen in the distance, to connect the 7-mile-long barrier island to mainland Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. 

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The Marc Basnight Bridge, North Carolina, provides continued access to the Outer Banks barrier islands by carrying Highway 12 across the Oregon Inlet. Critical to the state’s tourism industry, as well as to its hurricane evacuation plans, the bridge was designed to withstand the ever-shifting position of Oregon Inlet. 

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Two parallel trestle bridges make up the I-10 Twin Span Bridge, Louisiana. The 6-mile causeway crosses the eastern end of Lake Pontchartrain to connect Slidell with New Orleans. Both spans were rebuilt and opened to the public following extensive damage to the original spans from Hurricane Katrina in 2005. 

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The Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel is a 17.6-mile-long road structure crossing the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, extending north from the Hampton Roads, Virginia, area. It makes a more direct and expedient route for north-south traffic moving along the Eastern Seaboard. Low-lying transit routes along the coast are vulnerable to disruptions, with sea level rise causing blockages, breaking links and making through routes impassable.

Appendix

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List of places

FLORIDA Haulover Sandbar Key Largo Laguna Beach Mexico Beach Panama City Port St. Joe St. George Island St. Vincent Island Sunny Isles Beach Waccasassa Bay LOUISIANA Cameron Parish New Orleans Plaquemines Parish MAINE Biddeford Pool Brunswick Vinalhaven Island MARYLAND Berlin Chincoteague Bay Ocean City, MD Swampscott MASSACHUSET TS Boston Cape Cod Chappaquiddick Island Chatham Cohasset Eastham Everett Marblehead Marshfield Martha’s Vineyard Island Nantucket Island New Bedford Newburyport North Truro Peggotty Beach Rockport, MA Salisbury Scituate NEW HAMPSHIRE Seabrook

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NEW JERSEY Atlantic City Avalon Barnegat Bay Beach Haven Beach Haven West Brick Cape May County Deal Egg Harbor Township Elisabeth Lavallette Linden Little Egg Long Branch Longport Mantoloking Margate City Monmouth Beach Ocean City, NJ Ocean County Sea Bright Seaside Heights South Seaside Park Toms River Wildwood Crest NEW YORK STATE Brooklyn, New York Fire Island Fort Salonga Gardiner’s Island Long Island Manhattan, New York Queens, New York Shirley

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SOUTH CAROLINA Cape San Roman Capers Island Charleston Edisto Island Hilton Head Little River Mount Pleasant Myrtle Beach North Charleston Pea Island Saint Helena Island TEXAS Bay City Bolivar Peninsula Copano Bay Galveston Matagorda Port O’Connor Rockport, TX VIRGINIA Cape Charles Chincoteague Island Hampton Roads Metompkin Bay Newport News Norfolk, VA Portsmouth Smith Island Tangier Island

NORTH CAROLINA Davis Holden Beach Lea-Hutaff Island Lighthouse Island Morehead City Nags Head North Topsail Beach Ocean Isle Beach Portsmouth Island Rodanthe Topsail Beach RHODE ISLAND Matunuck Westerly

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CONNECTICUT Bridgeport Groton Norwalk

Books by Alex MacLean 2019 RENAISSANCES, introduction by Chantal Colleu-Dumond, Dominique Carré ­éditeur, Paris. 2018 Dünen, essay by Karsten Reise, KJM Buchverlag, Hamburg. 2015 Kurswechsel Küste, essay by Karsten Reise, Murmann Publishers, Hamburg. 2014 Supply + Demand, essay by Daniel ­Grossman, self-published, Boston. 2012 Up on the Roof: New York’s Hidden Skyline Spaces, introduction by Robert Campbell, essays by Alex MacLean, Dominique Carré éditeur/La Découverte, Paris. French and German editions. 2011 Vegas/Venice, introduction by Wolfgang Kemp, essay by Alex MacLean, Schirmer/ Mosel, Munich. German edition. Free hand to Alex MacLean, text by JeanLouis Cohen, Dominique Carré éditeur, Paris. Chroniques aériennes, text in collaboration with Gilles Tiberghien, Dominique Carré éditeur/La Découverte, Paris.

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2008 OVER: The American Landscape at the Tipping Point, introduction by Bill ­McKibben, Harry N. Abrams, New York. French, German and Italian editions. 2007 Visualizing Density, texts by Alex MacLean and Julie Campoli, Lincoln ­Institute of Land Policy, Cambridge. 2006 The Playbook, introduction by Susan Yelavich, Thames and Hudson, New York. French and Japanese editions. 2005 Air Lines, exhibition catalog, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem. 2003 Designs on the Land: Exploring America from the Air, texts by Jean-Marc Besse, James Corner, Alex MacLean and Gilles Tiberghien, Thames and Hudson, New York. French and Spanish editions. 2002 The Limitless City: A Primer on the Urban Sprawl Debate, text by Oliver Gillham, Island Press, Washington.

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Above and Beyond: Visualizing Change in Rural Areas, texts co-written by Julie Campoli, Elizabeth Humstone and Alex MacLean, APA Planners Press, Chicago.

1999 Vestiges of Grandeur: The Plantations of Louisiana’s River Road, text by Richard Sexton, Chronicle Books, San Francisco. 1996 Taking Measures Across the American Landscape, text co-written by James Corner and Alex MacLean, Yale University Press, New Haven. 1994 Cities of the Mississippi: 19th Century Images of Urban Development, text by John W. Reps, University of Missouri Press, Columbia. 1993 Look at the Land: Aerial Reflections on America, text co-written by Bill McKibben and Alex MacLean, Rizzoli, New York.

Acknowledgements This approach to climate change from the perspective of sea level rise has required the support and combined efforts of many individuals and institutions. I would like to express my gratitude to you all for enabling me to undertake this study, all the more so given that the reality of the climate crisis has become even clearer since the project began eighteen months ago and the impact of rising sea levels has been felt on all the world’s coasts. As this book nears completion, Europe itself is facing unprecedented heat waves, which have affected temperatures as far away as the coasts of Greenland.

I thank Bill McKibben for his perceptive introduction and for his ongoing work to raise awareness about the climate crisis, through which he has inspired generations of activists.

Special thanks to Nicole Zizzi and Tim Briggs for their critical support and work within my firm, Landslides Aerial Photography, and to Karsten Reise, who taught me a lot about coastal environments.

This project was made possible with financial support from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, Washington, D.C. It also benefited from the help of Peter Swift and Diana McCargo, Philo Ridge Farm, Charlotte, Vermont, and John Swift and the Mycorrhizal Fund, Los Osos, California. I also thank the Seaside Institute for their help while I was covering the Panhandle in Florida after Hurricane Michael.

Finally, I would like to thank my wife, Kate Conklin, for her support and for allowing me to travel for long periods of time away from home. I also thank my daughter Eliza for her help in organizing and writing the texts that feature in the book, and my daughter Avery for her ideas and encouragement.

It is thanks to the vision of my publisher, partner and friend, Dominique Carré, that this book was made possible. His rich contributions to the organization of the photographs and texts have guided the book since its inception.

I am also grateful to my brothers Paul MacLean and David MacLean for their contributions and financial support, and to my nephew Cullen Cassidy for his logistical assistance in shooting the New Jersey shoreline.

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Alex MacLean June 1st, 2020

Alex MacLean is an American pilot, photographer and ­environmental activist. Trained as an architect, he has been documenting the physical history and evolution of the land in the United States for forty-five years, denouncing the changes caused by human intervention. He is the author of best-selling books, including Over: The American Landscape at the Tipping Point, which received the Corine International Book Award in 2009, and Up on the Roof: New York’s Hidden Skyline Spaces, published in 2012.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020937881 Bibliographic information published by the German National Library The German National Library lists this publication in the ­Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de.

Layout Change is good, Paris

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, ­specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, re-use of i­­­llustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on ­microfilms or in other ways, and storage in databases. For any kind of use, permission of the copyright owner must be obtained.

Typesetting Sven Schrape, Berlin

ISBN 978-3-0356-2178-5 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-0356-2181-5

Cover design Amelie Solbrig, Berlin

German Print ISBN 978-3-0356-2179-2

Alex MacLean received support for this project from the ­Pulitzer Center for Crisis Reporting, Washington, D.C.

Editorial supervision Henriette Mueller-Stahl, Berlin

© 2020 Birkhäuser Verlag GmbH, Basel P.O. Box 44, 4009 Basel, Switzerland Part of Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

Translation French-English (all texts except for pp. 12–17) Garry White, Paris

Published originally in the French language under the title Impact © 2019, Dominique Carré, an imprint of Editions La Découverte, Paris

Copy Editing, Alex MacLean Eliza MacLean, Lincoln, MA

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Copy Editing, Birkhäuser Michael Wachholz, Berlin Lithography Fotimprim, Paris Paper Magno Volume, 130 g/m2 Printing GPS Group, Bosnia Herzegovina

www.birkhauser.com

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