Timing and magnitude of recent accelerated sea-level rise (North Carolina, United States)
- Andrew C. Kemp1,*,
- Benjamin P. Horton1,*,
- Stephen J. Culver2,
- D. Reide Corbett2,
- Orson van de Plassche3,
- W. Roland Gehrels4,
- Bruce C. Douglas5 and
- Andrew C. Parnell6
- 1Sea-Level Research Laboratory, Department of Earth and Environmental Science, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104, USA
- 2Department of Geological Sciences, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina 27858, USA
- 3Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, VU University, 1081 HV Amsterdam, Netherlands
- 4School of Geography, University of Plymouth, Plymouth PL4 8AA, UK
- 5International Hurricane Center, Florida International University, Miami, Florida 33199, USA
- 6School of Mathematical Sciences (Statistics), University College Dublin, Dublin 4, Ireland
- *E-mails: kempac{at}sas.upenn.edu; bphorton{at}sas.upenn.edu.
Abstract
We provide records of relative sea level since A.D. 1500 from two salt marshes in North Carolina to complement existing tide-gauge records and to determine when recent rates of accelerated sea-level rise commenced. Reconstructions were developed using foraminifera-based transfer functions and composite chronologies, which were validated against regional twentieth century tide-gauge records. The measured rate of relative sea-level rise in North Carolina during the twentieth century was 3.0–3.3 mm/a, consisting of a background rate of ~1 mm/a, plus an abrupt increase of 2.2 mm/a, which began between A.D. 1879 and 1915. This acceleration is broadly synchronous with other studies from the Atlantic coast. The magnitude of the acceleration at both sites is larger than at sites farther north along the U.S. and Canadian Atlantic coast and may be indicative of a latitudinal trend.
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- Received 29 April 2009.
- Revision received 13 June 2009.
- Accepted 22 June 2009.
- © 2009 Geological Society of America
