Sea level has risen by five inches (12 centimeters) since 2010 in the coastal areas of the U.S. southern and southeastern states, according to a study.
Rising seas over the past decade and a half are causing coastal communities in the southern U.S. to become more vulnerable to flooding and destruction, according to recent scientific studies.
Major cities in the crosshairs of this dramatic surge in sea levels include Houston, New Orleans, and Miami.
"The entire Southeast coast and the Gulf Coast is feeling the impact of the sea level rise acceleration," said Jianjun Yin, a climate scientist at the University of Arizona who authored one of the academic studies published in recent weeks, according to the Washington Post.
Yin's calculations show that the rate of the rise in sea level since 2010 has risen about one centimeter (.39 inches) per year in the region, which amounts to a rise in sea level of nearly five inches (12.7 centimeters) over the past 12 years through 2022, which is more than double the global average.
Yin's study suggests that recent catastrophic hurricanes, including two of the strongest storms to ever hit the U.S. -- Michael in 2018 and Ian in 2022 -- were made considerably worse by a faster-rising ocean. Data shows that the sea level is eight inches higher than it was in 2006 after Hurricane Katrina made landfall in New Orleans.
"It turns out that the water level associated with Hurricane Ian was the highest on record due to the combined effect of sea level rise and storm surge," said Yin.
The rise in sea levels compounded by shrinking wetlands, mangroves and shorelines due to massive development puts millions of residents who live along the southern U.S. coast at greater risk from severe storms and flooding.
The rise is "unprecedented in at least 120 years," according to Sönke Dangendorf of Tulane University in a second study published in Nature Communications, which found the same trend since 2010 across the U.S. Gulf Coast and southeastern coastlines.
"It's a window into the future," said Dangendorf, who said that the rates are so high in recent years that they're similar to what would be expected at the end of the century in a very high greenhouse gas emissions scenario.
Two additional studies which have not yet been published showed that in parts of Texas and Louisiana, sinking land has long been a factor that contributes to sea levels growing higher over time. However, in the latest studies, scientists show a rapid rise of sea levels in places such as Pensacola and Cedar Key, Florida, where the land is not sinking as rapidly as in places like Grand Isle, Louisiana or Galveston, Texas, according to the Post.
Scientists believe this rapid rise in sea level is a troubling climate change that could be affected by global warming. Dangendorf said the changes are more like what scientists once would have expected only if the world kept pumping massive amounts of planet-heating gases into the atmosphere.
"We have this forced acceleration, but then on top, we have that natural variability, and over the last couple of years we were unlucky, having that acceleration superimposed on natural variability," said Dangendorf.
