rationalskepticism.org

johnbrandt wrote:...the alarmist predictions we were told in Australia maybe ten years ago that the Pacific islands were "vanishing" and would be soon gone...when they plainly aren't.

Rising sea levels blamed on climate change are taking a toll on island nations in the South Pacific, with the world’s first climate refugees beginning a migration that is likely to continue for decades to come.

Inhabitants of parts of New Guinea and Tuvalu have already been forced to moved from low-lying areas.

New Zealand has agreed to accept migrants from Tuvalu, which experts think will be completely submerged by the middle of the century. Canada is funding the relocation of residents from parts of Vanuatu affected by global warming.

Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization warned in a recent report that the Pacific region is particularly vulnerable.

It warned of coastal communities already being inundated by rising seas, the loss of wetlands and coral bleaching, as well as an increase in disease and heat-related mortality resulting from climate change.

“Communities all over the Pacific are alarmed at coastal erosion and the advancing sea levels,” said Diane McFadzien, the South Pacifics regional climate change coordinator with the World Wildlife Fund. “We are already seeing signs of whole villages having to relocate … or important cultural sites such as burial grounds in Fiji being eroded.”