Venice Isn’t Alone: 7 Sinking Cities Around the World – How Stuff Works

Digital illustration of a sinking statue of liberty, USA, free to use, via Pixabay

Many big cities sit near the ocean. They became cities in the first place because their ports facilitated trade and travel by sea.

Coastal cities all over the world are sinking — a geological process called subsidence — and it’s happening at a rate that makes scientists nervous. If these bits of land didn’t have important cities on them, it’s likely nobody would notice, or, in some cases, that they wouldn’t be sinking at all…

Before the flood: how much longer will the Thames Barrier protect London? – the Guardian

The Thames barrier closure 8.15am Sunday 6 October 2013(by Chris Wheal CC BY 2.0 via Flickr).

The last time the Thames broke its banks and flooded central London was on 7 January 1928, when a storm sent record water levels up the tidal river, from Greenwich and Woolwich in the east as far as Hammersmith in the west. Built on flood plains, the capital was defended only by embankments. The flood waters burst over them into Whitehall and Westminster, and rushed through crowded slums. Fourteen died and thousands were left homeless…

How First Nations Are Asserting Sovereignty Over Their Lands and Waters – the Tyee

Bighouse and Ceremonial Canoe, Klemtu, BC (by Alan CC BY 2.0 via Flickr).

Indigenous Marine Protected and Conserved Areas hold a key to food security and balancing ecological and economic priorities. Part one of two.
Kitasu Bay sits within the traditional territory of the Kitasoo Xai’xais First Nation and is located on the Central Coast of British Columbia. Last summer the nation declared it a protected area under their own laws, closing it to commercial harvest by non-Indigenous fishers. Their declaration invited the provincial and federal governments to work with them to develop a co-governance model, but added, “we seek no permission…”

Hurricanes push heat deeper into the ocean than scientists realized, boosting long-term ocean warming, new research shows – the Conversation

Thermal (heat) image view of Category 5 Hurricane Maria in 2017, as seen by NASA’s Terra satellite. Yellow and orange are the warm ocean waters, and blue and white are the hurricane’s tall, cool cloud tops (courtesy of NASA, public domain via NASA earth observatory).

Seven years ago an exceptionally strong El Niño took hold in the Pacific Ocean, triggering a cascade of damaging changes to the world’s weather. Indonesia was plunged into a deep drought that fueled exceptional wildfires, while heavy rains inundated villages and farmers’ fields in parts of the Horn of Africa. The event also helped make 2016 the planet’s hottest year on record. Now El Niño is back…