City’s flooded future

Take a ride around the Charleston Peninsula when the tide is high, preferably at the highest tides during the full moon phase. Stay as close to the water as the roadways allow and you will be impressed that downtown Charleston is a city at a very low elevation.

Now in your imagination, raise the level of the ocean by 1-foot and you can sea that some streets and sidewalks and even some buildings will be flooded.


Continue using your imagination and conjure up a small storm with a storm surge of 2 feet.

Between the 1-foot global sea-level rise, the addition of a high tide, the addition of a 2-foot storm surge plus the storm waves on top of it all and the entire Charleston Peninsula will be flooded. In fact with a 1-foot rise in sea level, even a small to moderate storm occurring at low tide will likely flood large parts of the city.

…Drawing lines on maps showing where the shoreline will be as the result of a sea-level rise can be misleading. It’s not just the flooding that will drive people from Charleston (if no safety measures are taken). Before the floods actually arrive, storm surges, storm waves and the loss of infrastructure such as the loss of ports, roads, railroads, storm-water drainage and sewage-disposal facilities will make the peninsula unlivable. Putting it another way, the Port of Charleston facilities will be rendered useless long before they are actually flooded by sea level increases.

Charleston Post and Courier