The Siege of Miami • Hacker News Board

Re: The Siege of Miami

#21

Post by jmspring » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 3:15 AM UTC

zappo2938 wrote: post #8

I ride my bike around Fort Lauderdale 25 miles north of Miami. Sometimes I'm riding through 1/2 foot of water in the one of the most affluent neighborhoods in the United States. These people are underwater. They deny that it is going to get worse and they deny that it caused by humans. All new builds require being elevated several feet but I don't think it is going to help. I would never purchase a house here.

Given the hurricanes and flooding, it amazes me that insurance companies (and the government) continue to cover people living in such places...

Re: The Siege of Miami

#22

Post by labster » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 3:19 AM UTC

JimboOmega wrote: post #20

If this happens during a high tide... what happens when a storm comes? I'm not talking about 10+ feet from a hurricane... just a moderate gale should produce a couple feet on top of high tide, and wouldn't that just be the end of things? I remember having the same general thought when I was in Miami beach...

Exactly right. Very little is at risk from rising sea level at high tide. Places like this are at some risk during smaller storms, because they're so close to the new mean. However, a whole lot is at risk from hurricane storm surges. The change in mean high tide is not the important part of the story, it's the change in extreme events.

The atmosphere is like any other system of waves -- increase the energy in the system, and you increase the amplitude (the frequency being largely limited by the shape/harmonics of the Earth). So, big surprise that we'll expect more extreme events with climate change. Warm ocean water is the fuel for tropical cyclones, so risk in these low-lying areas can only get worse.

Re: The Siege of Miami

#23

Post by will_brown » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 3:28 AM UTC

JimboOmega wrote: post #20

If this happens during a high tide... what happens when a storm comes? I'm not talking about 10+ feet from a hurricane... just a moderate gale should produce a couple feet on top of high tide, and wouldn't that just be the end of things? I remember having the same general thought when I was in Miami beach...

In Miami and Fort Lauderdale the high tides were pretty dramatic around the time of the blood moon, but in terms of tide that was a phenomenon, I still don't think the tide has returned to normal since the blood moon but its definitely in a process of returning to normal.

As to rain, it usually will rain daily during wet season, yet "flooding" occurs maybe a dozen times over the year when storms have significant rainfall, and this is nothing new and so in my opinion not related to sea level rise. My opinion is "flooding" from rain is isolated to places with bad drainage, for example its more likely to happen miles inland in a place like Kendall more so than Brickell which is right on the Bay, or even more locally where one street may have flooding but the very next one doesn't.

Re: The Siege of Miami

#24

Post by RA_Fisher » Thu, Dec 17, 2015, 5:23 AM UTC

quanticle wrote: post #4

RA_Fisher wrote: post #3

So, basically, we should restructure our entire economy so some multi-millionaire's luxury vehicle and lawn won't flood on an island? Or ... spend hundreds of billions to save a wealthy municipality hundreds of millions?

It's one thing when Miami Beach gets flooded. As you said, it's a small wealthy suburb, and it can afford to protect itself against rising sea levels. On the other hand, the entire country of Bangladesh isn't much farther out of the water than Miami Beach. If you think the instability in Syria is bad now, what will happen when a country with literally ten times as many people becomes uninhabitable?

That's a good point, sincerely.