Ian Wishart writes in Investigate Daily:
Century old map throws new doubt on climate change sea level claims
A new book on the history of New Zealand has inadvertently stirred the climate change debate by revealing a near zero sea level increase over the past century.
The book, The Great Divide, includes a 100 year old map of Cloudy Bay lagoons in New Zealand, drafted back in 1912 to show the location of 20 kilometres of canals dug with wooden spades by ancient Maori.
However, when the 1912 map is shown alongside a satellite image of the same location from Google Earth, it reveals not only the startling accuracy of the original map (drafted at a time when aerial photography did not exist) but also a stunning lack of Pacific Ocean encroachment on the narrow shoal linking the lagoons to the sea.
The shoal is comprised of rock and pebbles, making it an ideal weathervane for sea level increase as it’s less prone to erosion than shifting sands.
Even the narrowest and lowest part of the bar, marked with a black squiggle on the 1912 map, remains the same in 2012.
The Great Divide goes on sale this week, and among its revelations is confirmation that a massive comet-strike into the ocean off New Zealand’s southern coast caused a 220 metre high tsunami that may have been responsible for erasing evidence of human habitation in early New Zealand.
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This might be a good time to review my story about how easy it is to get freaked out about sea level rise.
Oh, I so love this! Now THERE’S some data they can’t adjust down in the past or up in the present. Heck, they just can’t fiddle with this one. Wonderful stuff.
I was stationed in the US Air Force at RAF Bentwaters, Suffolk, UK in the early 1970’s, and remember stories of Dunwich disappearing into the North Sea beginning 1286 AD.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunwich
I suppose this is another sign of erosion caused by global warming, in this case the natural climate change of the Medieval Warm Period.
Closer to home, I’ve lived near the Point Arena coastal area of Northern California off and on since 1949. We have numerous low lying areas along the coast that haven’t changed in 63 years. The coastline here is rocky, and no glaciers or icecaps made it this far south so we don’t have any isostatic rebounding. I’m sure a case could be made that our proximity to the San Andreas fault causes something or other, but so far the evidence is of modest lateral movement rather than vertical.
In the face of myriad observations world wide of no significant sea level rise, we continually are informed that the San Francisco Bay Area will see 1.5 to 2 meters of sea level rise by 2100 (some “studies” say by 2050). However, San Francisco tide gauge records since June 30, 1854, show a steady increase of about eight inches per century (2 mm per year). http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local/san_francisco&id=7172590
To reach the expected five feet or more sea level rise by 2100, the rate of increase would have to accelerate immediately by a factor of at least 8.6 (to 17.2 mm per year), and maintain that rate for 87 years. Such a rate of increase hasn’t occurred for over 10,000 years, since the end of the last Ice Age.
I’m skeptical, as would anyone with a brain looking at numbers like these.
Ric Werme says:
April 26, 2012 at 1:26 pm
“On the other hand, a geologist who can’t compare two maps drawn to different scales can only have his mistake forgiven if he buys everyone a good beer.”
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I’m waiting for your retraction.
Any time you are ready.
First they use the ‘projected’ (i.e., alleged) sea-level rise to ban beach building.
Then they’ll make the entire coastline a wilderness keep-out zone,
so nobody will be able to observe the still-unchanged sea level.
I just had a look at a NZ government page about planning for sea level rise.
http://www.climatechange.govt.nz/emissions-trading-scheme/building/groups/climate-change-leadership-forum/2008-06/planning-for-sea-level-rise.html
No mention of the vertical movement of tectonic plates. No consideration of the fact that when the earth’s crust moves upward, there is effectively no change in sea level.
Are you suggesting that in 1912 they were smart and skilled enough to make an accurate map without sattelites and computer models?
Can’t be true. More likely that the map was made by psychics who were predicting the future.
If the sea levels are everywhere rising because of AGW. And the rise is not observable because the continents are also rising because of tectonic movement, isostatic rebound, swelling magma chambers, etc. then I submit a new and important theory of the earth:
The earth is getting larger.
Dave Wendt:
Venice being perhaps the most noted sorry.LMFAO maybe you will claim the Low Country’s SORRY but Venice is swamp land and allway’s has been and the Low Country’s ARE reclaimed sea bed Yes humans are not really a bright people in groups let’s build in the Flood Plain’s and then whine it’s flooding or the same on most coast line’s Look at N.O. what happened they let people build behind man madeflood walls and when they failed it was nature’s fault Really well did the Old Quater flood or just the reclaimed land they let people build behind the manmade flood wall. Human Stupidity know’s no bounds
Phil. says:
April 26, 2012 at 9:18 am
Don K says:
April 26, 2012 at 4:33 am
Maybe with the help of GPS or satellite radar altimeters, it might be possible in the future. But I think it will be a few years (GPS) or a few decades (RA) before readings with the necessary accuraccy are routinely available.
The BIFROST project has been doing this in Scandinavia for some time now.
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2002/2001JB000400.shtml
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Thanks Phil. I was sort of aware of the BIFROST project, but it seems to me that their error bounds — 1.3mm/yr radial I think — are a bit on the high side for sea level change which is probably on the order of 2-3 mm/yr. But maybe I haven’t thought it through. In any case, they are close enough that I think that GPS technology will be able to provide solid, usable readings for GIA+local tectonic motion in the not too distant future. I sort of vaguely understand the difficulties, and achieving that sort of accuracy is no small feat.
Clay Marley says:
“The earth is getting larger.”
Yes! And here is proof that would even pass climate peer review.
climatereflections says:
April 26, 2012 at 12:33 pm
So my question remains: can anyone point to concrete evidence of sea level rise “that has had a meaningful negative impact on the habitat or living conditions of the coastal area?”
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How about the coast line moved. (In the wrong direction) Why anyone thinks nature is static and never changes is beyond me. I find idiotic politicians a lot more frightening than a supposed sea level rise of 18 cm per century or a “modeled” temperature rise of a degree or two.
“That giant tsunami must have left traces elsewhere I’d imagine. Is there any hint to how long ago this may have happened?”
— Robin, over 50 years ago Immanuel Velikovky wrote a short series of books that you might enjoy. Earth in Upheaval detailed many geological findings that suggest catastrophic events shaped the the planet we see, including a couple of massive asteroid strikes that would have created tsunamis that swept across continents. In another book (Ages in Chaos(?)) he ties these events to written accounts and records found around the world.
He makes are very strong case that the earth experienced more than one near-extinction event within recent times.
I work with old RP plans fairly regularly. Swamps, streams, and rivers move fairly quickly over the course of a 100 years. The ocean is held back by a flexible movable medium called sand. Its amazingly resilient stuff. Seasonally (depending on cyclones and lulls) the dunes will move back and forth by 10’s of metres, but compared to 100 year old maps, remains consistently similar.
Honestly, a rise of 1.8 millimetres over 100 years will not be noticed by a sand dune.
@ur momisugly Smokey ““The earth is getting larger.”
Yes! And here is proof that would even pass climate peer review.”
Well, I’m convinced! (Yes, I know that there is a video “expanding Earth my ass”, but that one is boring.)
So my question remains: can anyone point to concrete evidence of sea level rise “that has had a meaningful negative impact on the habitat or living conditions of the coastal area?”
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How about the coast line moved. (In the wrong direction)
Hi Gail, I’m Mike Combs, probably a relative by marriage since we Combs are the largest closely related family in the US.
Sea level rise was very beneficial for San Francisco. During the Ice Age San Franciscans would have had to go more than 26 miles east, past the Farallon Islands, to get to the beach (sea level was over 400 feet lower then). If it hadn’t been for sea level rising an average of about three feet per century for over 12,000 years, the “City by the Bay” would just be the town by the Sacramento River mudflats. Sign about that, Tony Bennett.
“I lost my shoes,
in the Sacramento mud flats”
I was wondering where would water go from decreasing ground water level and melted ice from mountains and poles, if it is not sea, then where? May be sea water level rise is only for countries near equator like Maldives, Bangladesh etc. visit: devbahadurdongol.blogspot.com scientific analysis and answer.
The SEA-saw Hypothesis
AGW is occurring and stable sea levels do not disprove it.
Obviously the water from melting glaciers has increased the weight of the oceans causing the seabeds to sink. This downward pressure on the earth’s molten core is relieved by an uplifting of the continents. This creates the appearance of a stable sea level.
This SEA-saw Hypotheisis can be experimentally confirmed by visiting a children’s playground. But dont go too often and definitely don’t take photos much less movies or you will be confronted by angry deniers questioning your motives and making accusations of data molestation.
Eugene WR Gallun
I never was as funny as I used to be.
As a resident Kiwi and qualified geologist I agree with Bill Y. Uncanny coincidence.
Hello! anyone out there? Time (15:56 EST in Brisbane) for an update on the figures. 2670 votes, and the Dismissives are at 43%.
The Pompous Git says:
April 26, 2012 at 11:37 am
I think you will find that then, as now, aerial photography for cartographic purposes consists in creating a series of photographs that are stitched together.
It’s called a photomosaic, should the subject come up at one of your parties.
I have a magnetic anomaly map of western Tasmania on my study wall, much of which was due to my friend and pilot Peter. Had he flown at sufficient height to make the image in one shot, he would certainly have asphyxiated.
Good aerial photos (suitable for mapmaking) have to be taken from directly overhead — even a high oblique shot will produce more lens distortion toward the edges than an overhead. Overhead shots require a photographer to aim straight down, using a stable platform, flown on a constant course, a constant airspeed, at a constant altitude — given the state of the art in 1912, the only aircraft meeting the requirements of stability, being capable of carrying an observer/photographer, and operating at a useful altitude was the deHaviland FE-2. Find one in an old barn somewhere in NZ and you can strengthen the theory that the map was drawn from a photomosaic.
Until then, my money’s on a very professional cartographer.
I have a post card of a beach resort in Puerto Rico from the 1970s. I Googled earthed the same place and lo and behold no change in sea level. Seems to me that this is an exercise that many of us could do …. dig up those old post cards ..!
Just to clear up any confusion, I was referring to aerial photography in New Zealand not being available in 1912…first aerial photo taken in 1919, and first used for cartography in 1926. See http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/modern-mapping-and-surveying/3
An Air Force aircraft spotted what was suspected to be a drug-running boat off Darwin about 30 years ago. In evidence before the Court, the boat crew argued that they were outside the (then) Territorial limits. The Prosecution produced maps to show the position of the vessel relative to the shore, which was fixed by the aircraft pilot noting that it was two wing widths offshore at 1,000 feet. It turned out that the maps being relied upon were more than 100 years old. It’s not only climate science that has a problem with verification.
(Story from memory, exact details might be slightly different).
holy island ne england is cut off by the tide twice every hours – it was described by Bede writing in
700 ad it is exactly the same as he describwed it in 2012 – NO Change in sea level in 1300 plus years!
peter johnson
Mike Lewis
April 28 11.16 am
I am a New Zealander living and working in Germany ( thats in the North ) the time here right now is 21.24 the time in New Zealand ( which is in the South ) right now is 07.24