From the Statue of Liberty to Nasa’s launchpads: The American landmarks under threat from climate change revealed
New study has reveals the full extent of the crisis facing America – and say almost two dozen landmarks are at risk
Include Boston’s historic districts, the Harriet Tubman National Monument in Maryland
Nasa sites including Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida also at risk
By Mark Prigg
Published: 12:52 EST, 21 May 2014 | Updated: 15:53 EST, 21 May 2014
Climate change is threatening U.S. landmarks from the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbour to the launchpads at Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
A new study has revealed the full extent of the crisis facing America’s most cherised landmarks – and says almost two dozen are at risk.
They include Boston’s historic districts, the Harriet Tubman National Monument in Maryland and an array of Nasa sites including the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida.
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The new report says the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbour (left) to the launchpads at Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center (right) are at risk, also named were The Castillo de San Marcos (top middle), the oldest masonry fort in North America and parts of Boston
NEW YORK’S PROBLEM
Landmarks at risk include the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island in New York Harbor, which was the entry point for 14 million immigrants from 1886 to 1924.
Sea level has risen 12 inches (30 centimeters) around New York City over the past century, the report said.
Then came Hurricane Sandy in 2012, which flooded most of Liberty Island and all of Ellis Island, destroying most of their infrastructure and forcing their closure for months.
New York is now rebuilding electrical systems on the islands ‘as much as 20 feet above sea level and designing the heating and air conditioning systems to withstand flooding,’ the report said.
Other sites at risk include the first permanent British colony in North America at Jamestown Island in Virginia, and historic Charleston, South Carolina.
Another is Fort Monroe, where the first African slaves arrived in 1619 and where 250 years later they were given refuge as ‘contraband’ of the American Civil War, a move that paved the way for the abolition of slavery.
Also under threat are the César Chávez National Monument in Keene, California with floods, rising sea levels and fires, scientists said on Tuesday.
National Landmarks at Risk, a report published by the Washington-based Union of Concerned Scientists, highlighted more than two dozen sites that potentially face serious natural disasters.
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‘The imminent risks to these sites and the artifacts they contain threaten to pull apart the quilt that tells the story of the nation’s heritage and history,’ Adam Markham, director of climate impacts at the union, a non-profit organization for science advocacy in Washington D.C. and the study’s co-author, said in a statement.
The report is not slated for publication in a scientific journal, said Brenda Ekwurzel, senior climate scientist who co-authored the report.
It said that reducing carbon emissions could minimize the predicted risks posed by climate change.
‘We must prepare our cherished landmarks for these worsening climate impacts and take steps to make climate resilience a national priority,’ the scientists wrote.
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Where could be affected?
‘At the same time, we must work to minimize these risks in the future by reducing the carbon emissions that are causing climate change and its accompanying impacts.’
The report highlights 30 at-risk locations chosen because the science behind the risks they face is robust, and because together they shine a spotlight on the different kinds of climate impacts already affecting the United States’ cultural heritage, the team said.
At some sites - such as Liberty and Ellis Islands and Cape Hatteras – steps have already been taken to prepare for these growing climate risks.
At many other sites, such efforts have not yet begun.
‘As these case studies illustrate, climate change is no longer a distant threat for others to worry about,’ the team said.
‘The consequences are already underway, with serious and growing risks to the places and communities we care about.‘
THE LANDMARKS AT RISK
Alaska: Cape Krusenstern National Monument and Kivalina — Bering Land Bridge National Monument and Shishmaref
California: Groveland — César E. Chávez National Monument — NASA Ames Research Center
Colorado: Mesa Verde National Park
Florida: Castillo de San Marcos, Fort Mose, St. Augustine’s historic downtown, and the Lincolnville Historic District in St. Augustine — Prehistoric shell structures at Ten Thousand Islands and Canaveral National Seashore — NASA Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral
Hawaii: Kaloko-Honokōhau and Pu’uhonua o Hōnaunau National Historic Parks
Louisiana: NASA Michoud Assembly Facility
Maryland: Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Monument — Historic Annapolis and U.S. Naval Academy
Massachusetts: Boston’s Faneuil Hall and the Blackstone Block Historic District
Mississippi: NASA Stennis Space Center
New Mexico: Bandelier National Monument and Santa Clara Pueblo
New York: Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island
North Carolina: Cape Hatteras Lighthouse
South Carolina: Charleston’s Historic District
Texas: Johnson Space Center
Virginia: Historic Jamestown — Fort Monroe National Monument — NASA Wallops Flight Facility and Langley Research Center
The report concluded that action must be taken now.
‘If future generations of Americans are to experience the joy and wonder that these extraordinary places engender, we must act now to protect them from the impacts of climate change today and prepare them for expected additional changes tomorrow.
‘We must also take steps to minimize the risks of climate change in the future by taking immediate action to reduce the carbon emissions that are driving up the planet’s temperature.
‘The historic legacy of the United States is at stake.’
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Drastic change: The Jefferson Memorial in Washington DC one day may only be accessible by boat
Jamestown, Virginia – the first permanent English colony – could be completely inundated due to rising sea levels, and the nearby Fort Monroe, ‘will become an island unto itself within 70 years,’ Markham said.
In the western United States, rising temperatures have led to an increase in wildfires by melting winter snowpacks earlier, leaving forests drier for longer, the report said.
Among California’s 20 largest fires since 1932, a dozen have happened since 2002, the report said.
An unrelated report published on Monday showed that the California drought has cost thousands of jobs and $1.7 billion to farmers in the state’s Central Valley. Governor Jerry Brown has partly blamed climate change for the drought.
Earlier this months Scientists warned that vast glaciers in West Antarctica are locked in an irreversible thaw linked to global warming – and created incredible images show the effect the melt would have on some of the U.S’s classic coastal city areas.
Experts say the melt could add 12 feet (1.2 to 3.7 meters) to current sea levels in a few hundred years and the images illustrate the impact this increase would have on cities including Miami, Boston and San Francisco.
The photographs were developed by Pittsburgh-based digital artist Nickolay Lamm, based on sea level-rise mapping data from Climate Central.
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Watery Boston: This image shows what the city’s Back Bay would look like if sea levels rose by 12 feet, with roads leading to the bay completely submerged
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Soggy playing conditions: AT&T Park in San Francisco would need to become a water polo venue, according to Nickolay Lamm’s digital imaging
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Flooded: The San Diego Convention Center would be completely unusable if sea levels rose by 12 feet, with water almost encroaching onto the road next to it
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Venice Beach: Los Angeles’ famous coastal hot-spot might only be navigable by canoe in the future, with the beach totally submerged by the waters of the Pacific
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Road to nowhere: Miami’s Ocean Drive is a popular spot for a stroll and a cruise, but in a few hundred years it might be better suited to fishing expeditions
In the shocking pictures the Jefferson Memorial in Washington D.C is surrounded by water, Ocean Drive in Miami looks like it would only be navigable by boat and Crissy Field in San Francisco is mostly under water.
And you’d need waders to walk around The San Diego Convention Center, according to the predictions.
A Nasa study looking at 40 years of ground, airplane and satellite data shows the melt is happening faster than scientists had predicted, crossing a critical threshold that has begun a domino-like process.
Some scientists believe that a build-up of man-made greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is affecting wind patterns around Antarctica, driving warmer waters towards the continent.
Bob Ward, from the Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy at London School of Economics and Political Science, said: ‘Although such extreme sea level rise is only likely to occur after several centuries of global warming, these startling images should help U.S politicians and the public to understand the scale of the risks created by climate change.’
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Alarming: The Boston Harbor Hotel will need more than a few sandbags in the future to keep the water out, if Climate Central is correct
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San Francisco’s Crissy Field may one day be completely submerged
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How San Francisco’s Crissy Field might one day look from above
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Water sight: Harvard campus would make for a nice boating lake in the future, apparently
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Soaked: The lush lawn in front of the Military College of South Carolina may be lost forever
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Sea-ing is believing: San Diego’s Coronado Island may one day be claimed by the ocean
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2635349/From-Statue-Liberty-Nasas-launchpads-The-American-landmarks-threat-climate-change-revealed.html#ixzz32PdOUEsS
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2635349/From-Statue-Liberty-Nasas-launchpads-The-American-landmarks-threat-climate-change-revealed.html
Cops In Dubai Are Using Google Glass To Catch Speeding Drivers
Lisa Eadicicco10May 21, 2014, 08.32 PM
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Ayuda Web
A police officer wearing Google Glass
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If you think traffic light cameras and discreet roadside cops are irritating enough, authorities may upgrade to Google Glass for catching speeding drivers soon enough.
Police in Dubai have begun using Google’s wearable display in an effort to capture traffic violators, according to a report by Gulf News spotted by The Verge.
The technology is currently being tested by the Dubai Police Smart Services Department using two applications for tracking road-bound crimes.
One app allows police officers to take photos of traffic violations using Glass, which would instantly be uploaded to the police department’s system. The other application helps authorities identify wanted cars.
If successful, Google Glass would make it extremely simple for officers to catch traffic offenders.
Police would simply tap the side of the smart eyewear to snap a photo, and the image along with the date, time, and location at which it was taken would be stored in its system.
A cop would only need to look at a license plate number while wearing Glass to determine whether or not the vehicle is wanted by the authorities. The app would automatically cross reference the plate number with the traffic department’s database. If a cop does spot a wanted vehicle, the app would display a notification.
“If it passes our testing criteria as well as we see that it is a useful device, then we might decide to launch it and buy more of it,” Colonel Khalid Nasser Al Razooqi said to Gulf News.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen police officers using Google Glass, but the fact that its spreading to different markets hints that it could play a large role in law enforcement in the future. In February, the New York Police Department announced that it was field testing Google Glass in “a variety of circumstances.” CopTrax, a surveillance vendor, also collaborated with police in Byron, Georgia to install software on Glass for recording traffic violations.
Google Glass, which just became available for anyone in the U.S. last week, is still in early testing. You can buy it for $1,500, but it’s not exactly what the final product will be like. However, despite the fact that it’s still in beta, we’ve already seen may implementations of how it could be used in the workplace. From easily checking in passengers at airlines to improving medical procedures, Glass is already making its way into various fields.