In a recent PBS documentary, the mayor of Norfolk, Virginia, Paul Fraim, talks about how flooding has become a monthly occurrence in his town, and how global warming and sea level rise are as much a daily issue for him as education and fighting crime. In some parts of Norfolk, streets turn into rivers at high tide. Homes are flooded five out of six years. People lose their carpets, their appliances, their savings. And they can't afford to move elsewhere.
Sea levels have risen 14 inches in Norfolk since 1930--almost double the global rate. Part of this alarming change is due to the natural sinking of the area's soggy tidal lands, but part of it is due to the rising sea levels brought about by global warming. Like stranded polar bears in the North Pole, like disappearing island nations in the Pacific, waterlogged Norfolk is yet another symbol of global warming at work. And even though Norfolk is within spitting distance of our nation's capital, Congress still hasn't seemed to grasp the seriousness of the situation.
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