Priory Sea Level Rise Materials for Lesson One

The aim of this lesson To explore various causes of flooding. To understand the causes of and differences between sea surges and thermal expansion of the oceans. To prepare the ground for thinking about sea level rise in the future.

Jaywick, Essex, 1953 What do you think caused this? What is your evidence? Case Study 1: The East Coast floods of 1953

High What happens to the sea level when the air pressure changes from high to low?

Low What happens to the sea level when the air pressure changes from high to low?

What do you think a strong wind does to sea levels?

When air pressure is LOW (which makes the sea higher) and a strong wind is blowing, it leads to a sea surge.

Sea surges can go a long way inland – this was Sheerness, Kent, in 1953

Impacts of the 1953 North Sea Surge  Massive loss of lives:  32,000 people forced to evacuate.  Tens of thousands of animals drowned.  Approx. 100,000 people lost their homes  4,500 houses and buildings destroyed  200,000 hectares of land flooded.  Great damage to infrastructure. Netherlands 1835 people 19 people 307 people Power Stations Roads Railway s Sewage services Water services Gasworks INFRASTRUCTURE Cost of damaged infrastructure was £1.2 billion (today’s price).

There are two other reasons why the sea can rise – do you know what they are?

rriculum/Sea_Level/Ice_Volume/acti vity.html Reason One

yer_embedded&v=fuvY5YG5zA4 Reason Two

What else causes flooding – what is this?

In October 2000, the ground was full of water after days of steady rain. It was saturated which means that the soil could not absorb any more water and so when heavy rain came, it went straight into the rivers.

Hyetos is the Greek for rain and Iso is the Greek for equal so what do you think an Isohyet might be? Where’s Lewes?

Case Study 2 – Lewes, 12 – 13 th October

Priory Headteacher

What do you think the flood cost? 613 homes flooded 217 businesses 7 Public buildings 504 vehicles Extra council services £20.5m £64m £1.8m £6.3m £1.7m £94.3m TOTAL

This is what happened in Lewes. Which single word describes these? Rail connections lost. Roads under water and town cut in half. 13 electricity sub stations stopped working. The fire station was flooded. Gas supplies failed. Main Lewes sewage pumping station out of action.

Quick exercise Who do you think might GAIN from such an event once it is over? What jobs needs doing? Who might pay for those jobs? In pairs or at your tables, list as many as you can.

Remember this? Sea level rise at Sheerness (Kent) since 1834

What’s the difference between the 1953 storm and predicted sea level rise? We can plan!

CGI image of London flooded This your first text –Second Third –Fourth »And so on

New York Battery Park Underpass 30 th October, 2012 (AP Photo/Louis Lanzano)

Homework We are going to invite you to view an Ouse valley fly-through under different sea level rise conditions and we want you to look especially at the implications to INFRASTRUCTURE. What key things are affected at what level of sea rise? And what would you do and who might gain – bring your ideas to the next lesson.