US Navy Map of the Future

[Earthnut]

[IHaveGoodInstincts]

That's a tough pic to post without an explanation. It puts Utah, which has the third highest mean elevation in the US, totally under water. It puts Kings Peak, the highest point in Utah at 13,500 feet under water as well.

[Walkabout]

It also puts all of Illinois as the end of the Mississippi waterway but not any of the ohio river valley under water. would Lake Michigan become filled with sea water and there for contaminating the large cashe of fresh water on this planet??

[Earthnut]

It's a bit confusing, I agree, and, I have tried to find an official site with it posted and haven't yet. I have no idea where this image originated from, but considering politics and military secrets, it could be from anywhere. Snopes and TruthOrFiction don't mention it as either true or false, they just don't mention it. Now that's weird.

[hippyroo]

It's like looking at inkblots to me... what do you see?

[Libby]

I keep looking at this map, trying to figure out what point the originator is trying to make. It's one of the least convincing "predictions" I've seen.

The coastal areas from Maine to Texas: Certainly there are low-lying coastal areas vulnerable to rising sea levels. Sea levels are rising not only because of melting ice-caps and glaciers, but also because the world ocean (there's really only one ocean, they all interconnect) is a huge heat reservoir. As more heat gets into the ocean then the water expands, further encroaching onto the land. But the situation is further complicated by human habitation along the coastlines, particularly those of the Carolinas, and some existing methods to protect valuable real estate from the ocean weren't built to deal with the rising sea levels we're already seeing. Also, some of the areas inland from those low-lying coasts have been drained, with the consequence that some areas are below current sea-level but so far have been protected by levees. If the coastal protection fails, the sea will flood all those low-lying areas, possibly covering millions of square miles.

The Mississippi: Flooding along the course of the Mississippi River happens for a different reason (although there is an interconnectedness between what happens in the ocean and what happens in the atmosphere). Flooding occurs because of high levels of rainfall. Intervention by humankind has resulted in some land areas adjacent to the Mississippi being at a lower level than the river itself which is contained within levees. On occasions, as happened last year, when the Mississippi is carrying more water than can be contained, levees is some areas are deliberately breached so that the extra water floods into rural areas rather than towns or cities. But for flooding to occur to that extent along the whole flood plain of the Mississippi, there would need to be excessive and prolonged rainfall in most of the watersheds feeding the Mississippi, and I can't imagine what kind of weather systems could provide that.

So, in those two cases (the east/south-east coastal areas and the Mississippi River) there are risks of inundation, but partially, and for different reasons.

The west coast: There's a distinct difference between the east coast and the west coast. The east coast ocean is the Atlantic Ocean. The Atlantic basin is a sea floor spreading basin. Geologically speaking, not much happens on the east coast. The Mid-Atlantic Ridge just adds a bit more to the fairly flat ocean basin, slowly pushing it sideways (so to speak). The west coast is different because it sits on a subduction zone. There, the Pacific ocean sea-floor is moving under the continent, and pushing the land upwards (as well as creating volcanoes and mountain chains). Flooding there is unlikely to happen as much as on the east coast because most of the continental shelf is higher (than sea-level) as compared with the east coast.

As far as that map is concerned, it's ambiguous to say the least, if not downright disingenuous. I really can't understand the wodge of flooding in the south-west, which presumably represents the flatter land to the east of the Sierra Nevada range - unless it's something to do with the eventual splitting of the west coast along the line of the San Andreas fault which could open up the Bay of California and maybe permit influx of the Pacific Ocean. But that could be a possibility so far in the future that it has nothing to do with the real-life situation that we're currently facing and that we need to do something about.

So, that map seems to be conflating different kinds of possibilities for differing kinds of reasons over different kinds of time-scales.

I really loathe the scaremongering that goes on with the conspiracy theories that abound on the internet. In some ways, we really are heading into an Armageddon of our own making, but the predictions we need to take note of are the scientific predictions which are borne out of meticulous measurements and forming well-founded hypotheses and, subsequently, theories.

As for the predictions of TEOTWAWKI – suffice it to say that we'll all still have to buy presents and food because 25 December 2012 will be pretty much the same as 25 December 2011.

But what I have learned from responses in this topic is that I really need a better understanding of how the geology/geography of the USA relates to state boundaries. Most country boundaries in Europe are based on geography rather than the geometric state boundaries in the USA, and I get confused about things like the Mississippi River, which apparently doesn't spend much of its time in the state of Mississippi.

[Guest Blueboy]

Yeehaaaa, oceanfront property for sale now. Get it before the deluge! A real steal! For once Cayce's seems more accurate.

[Walkabout]

whom ever made that map put Little Rock too high on the map; but its nice to see Illinois is high and dry. I don't believe that much of California would be under water, they don't call them the "high Sierra's" for nothing. after that said ; thanks Blueboy for the map.

[Earthnut]

Between the scientist's unevitable big earthquake along the West coast and the other one in Yellowstone, I can see where these maps are coming from. There are no "official" government statements, only statements from the scientific community.

[Guest Blueboy]