Smith Island residents are known for their strength, endurance, and community. But now they are faced with a very difficult decision: stay living on the island they've called home for generations, or take a buyout offered by the State of Maryland and avoid sinking into the Chesapeake Bay.
And we mean that literally.
While Superstorm Sandy only directly damaged nine homes on the island, studies show that massive erosion coupled with the threat of storms and an ever-increasing shoreline threaten to destroy the island's residents. A fascinating article in the reports:
Sea level is rising in that part of the bay by about an inch per decade, according to government measurements. The ground also is slowly sinking, and the two forces combined to raise the water a little more than a foot in the past century.
Scientists say that global climate change will accelerate the process, with projections of sea level increase ranging from two to four feet or even more by the end of the century. All but a few spots on the island could be under water if sea level rises four feet or more.
"By 2100 they've got to have some alternative," said Court Stevenson, a University of Maryland ecologist who's studied coastal erosion and the bay's vanished and vanishing islands.
