NASA is watching the sea rise

NASA is watching the sea level. This is important as

"It's estimated that more than 100 million lives are potentially impacted by a one-meter (3.3-foot) increase in sea level," said Dr. Waleed Abdalati, head of the Cryospheric Sciences Branch at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland.

The sea is rising and rising faster of late . . .

"In the last 50 years sea level has risen at an estimated rate of .18 centimeters (.07 inches) per year, but in the last 12 years that rate appears to be 3 centimeters (.12 inches) per year. Roughly half of that is attributed to the expansion of ocean water as it has increased in temperature, with the rest coming from other sources," said Dr. Steve Nerem, associate professor, Colorado Center for Astrodynamics Research, University of Colorado, Boulder.

Melt 10% of the ice on the planet and the ocean will rise an estimated 22 feet!

We’ve found that the largest likely factor for sea level rise is changes in the amount of ice that covers Earth. Three-fourths of the planet’s freshwater is stored in glaciers and ice sheets, or about 220 feet of sea level," said Dr. Eric Rignot, Principal Scientist for the Radar Science and Engineering Section at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. Research results by Rignot and partners, published in an October 2004 article in Science Magazine, further offer evidence that ice cover is shrinking much faster than thought, with over half of recent sea level rise due to the melting of ice from Greenland, West Antarctica’s Amundsen Sea, and mountain glaciers.

Read about the sea level watch at the NASA site here.