City officials are trying to cement a unified response plan to confront what some climate scientists say is an increased risk of flooding in parts of Manhattan.Floods this week in Missouri, Arkansas, Indiana, Ohio, and Kentucky have resulted in at least 11 deaths. A number of local climatologists are predicting that New York City — with its nearly 600 miles of waterfront — faces similar risks, or worse.
A research scientist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory of Columbia University, Klaus Jacob, predicts that increasing sea levels and unpredictable weather patterns tied to global warming mean that hurricane-type storms in New York could increase to a frequency of one every decade.
Over the next 80 years, sea levels around New York City could rise anywhere from 11.8 to 37.5 inches, according to calculations issued by the U.S. Global Change Research Program, a federal agency. The result could be flooding in low-lying neighborhoods and the repeated shutdowns of the metropolitan transportation system.
Unified Response Is Sought For Flood Plan for the City
The Bloomberg administration has tasked a number of its agencies, including the Department of Environmental Protection, the Department of Transportation, the Department of Buildings, the Department of Sanitation, the Department of Parks and Recreation, and the city's Office of Emergency Management, to work in concert with the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Red Cross to improve the city's response to flooding.
Well then why worry? We're obviously in capable hands...
4 comments:
The science behind GW is absolutely pathetic, and has failed to produce even a single verifiable prediction. There is a growing number of scientists that in fact think we are entering a period of cooling, which is what the NASA satellites have been indicting for the past 10 years.
Regardless, NYC is vulnerable to hurricanes. Back in 1821 a hurricane came right through the narrows. It caused the hudson river to converge with the east river as far north as Canal st. Everything below canal street was underwater!
The 1893 hurricane wiped out Hog Island off the end of the Rockaways.
And the 1938 hurricane which crossed over long island and killed 200, also killed 10 in NYC.
All this without benefit of SUVs.
OMG!! Floods in Arkansas! Let's have a stroke! More environmental hyperventilation. Midwest floods like this are caused by ice jams. Ice colects around a narrow river section (or bridge) and water backs up behind it. Until it melts or breaks. This can't happen in NYC. Remember, the East River is not a river. The Hudson down here is an estuary. A salt water estuary. We won't have an ice jam around the Verrazano. And hey, if global warming is so bad (not) then why all the ice dams?
If a hurricane comes through the narrows, rather WHEN a hurricane comes through, we'll get wet. Very wet. Does anybody REALLY think we have the will to do something today to prevent it? What would they have us do? Build hurricane-proof sea walls 50 feet high around the island? That would be attractive.
We could send everyone to NJ and freeload for awhile.
Is global warming caused by man? Perhaps, but scientists recently discovered that the Martian polar caps were receding. It is very possible that our sun, like many other suns is a variable star, and cooling and warming is cyclical. I believe that GW and politics are a very unfortunate mix that allow for little science and lots of ballyhoo. Only the very young are foolish enough to believe that a hurricane will not hit the NYC area. Does anyone remember Carol, Hazel, or Donna? My mother summered in Newport when she was young and told me stories about the 1938 storm that almost destroyed Long Island and Rhode Island.
Not "if" but "when".
ooooooooooooh c'mon with this bs.
natIonAl GEoGRAphic's moaning since the 60s that Venice was going to be underwater by the 80s.
IS IT ?
Post a Comment