Maldive Flooding, Sea level rise, Tide gauges

Maldive Islands Vanishing ?

Yesterday the media was full of stories that the Maldive Islands in the Indian Ocean are being flooded by greenhouse / global warming induced rising sea levels.

The actual news event was a speech to the UN Millenium Summit talkfest by the President of the Maldives but the media willingly trotted out the usual IPCC inspired misleading scaremongering about threats from rising sea levels. Other Pacific nations inhabiting atolls trot out the same line all trying to get western sympathy and aid. Good work if you can get it I suppose.

What is the truth about the Maldive Islands. They are a group of coral atolls that like all atolls, exist because the submarine crust beneath them is SINKING and the upward and outward growth of the coral keeps pace with this sinking, giving rise to the typical circular or horseshoe shapes surrounding lagoons. Over the millenia, erosion and then landforming processes by sea and wind have built up the small, low lying land forms. Because of this origin atolls, more than other landforms, are at the mercy of normal sea level fluctuations due to El Nino events, storm surges and tide cycles.

This is your destiny if you live on an atoll !!

Check the ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA CD 99. search Atolls, you will even find an article specifically mentioning the Maldives formed over sinking continental crust.

For a comprehensive account of the IPCC myths about claimed "greenhouse sea level rise" see John Daly's article "Testing The Waters". John's article on The Greening Earth Soviety site is an excellent survey for the layman (and non-specialist scientists) of the complex science behind the study of sea levels and associated crustal movements. He presents evidence from tide gauges in South Africa, India and West Australia, all surrounding the Indian Ocean and Maldives and none of these demonstrate rising sea levels as the IPCC claim. This and other sea level related articles can also be found on JD's web site, see my links page.

Of course we can understand leaders of these assorted postage stamp sized island countries all trying to get money out of the west but it is time the media stopped peddling IPCC biased, incorrect and exaggerated science.

If the Maldives folks were serious, they would look very carefully at the potential effects of coral harvesting that goes on there, seeing coral is so intimately linked with the existence of their land. See MS Encarta 2000.

P.S. 12, September A paragraph in the Weather Action Bulletin for September reports an article in the Daily Telegraph 6, August, quoting a new study, has found that Pacific sea levels have fallen 2.5 inches and experts at the Tuvalu Meteorological Service say this means they would survive for another 100 years. Great news guys but bad for the economy, although there might be a saving on airfares and New York hotel bills.

You read it first here.

Posted 8, September, 2000, updated 12, September.