- 8 hours ago
Years Of Living Dangerously
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00:07Miami, or as I like to call it, Shangri-La, where old people come to retire, and young
00:15people come to stay young. It's one of America's most vital cities. I've always wondered what
00:24it would be like to get a place down here. Maybe a swanky pad like this one. It's got
00:31all the amenities. Custom gourmet kitchen, the soaking tub, and of course, unobstructed
00:40views of the water. And this is the guy who would sell it to me. So gorgeous property.
00:48Very nice home. This is it. This is the life. Yeah, we're on the Venetian Islands right now.
00:52Basically, it separates Miami Beach from downtown Miami. Unbelievable.
00:57And this is like the most desired neighborhood-ish, right? Exactly.
01:02And in fact, are property values going up? Values are going up like crazy. I mean,
01:08it's amazing what you see five years ago today. The increases in prices are incredible. Yeah.
01:13Miami is beautiful. You have the weather. It's really like the place to be.
01:17Do people ever talk about climate change and the rising sea levels? Is that a concern of any of
01:23your clients? For my clients and other friends in the industry, it's not really a concern.
01:28Because it's paradise. It's tropical. It's gorgeous. And yet it is, according to the scientists,
01:36one of the most vulnerable to climate change. Sea rises a couple of feet. This whole thing gets,
01:41but no one, it's just like, yeah, nah, whatevs. When I was a kid, sea level rise wasn't even a
01:48thing.
01:49Back then, oceans were scary because of pirates, sharks, and violent storms.
02:20I was on the phone with my father during Hurricane Katrina, when the line went dead.
02:26I was amazed I ever saw him again.
02:29He said, my brother is standing on his house. Everything he ever had is gone.
02:35That's crazy. We used to kick the soccer ball right here.
02:38This is my family's neighborhood, the neighborhood I love.
02:43Everyone who stayed went into their attics, but the problem is the water kept going,
02:48and there was no way for them to ever get out.
02:53There were body bags all along the road.
02:56Ever since Katrina, it seems to me that storms are coming faster and more furiously.
03:02To find out whether this is all just in my head, I'm here in the Bahamas with my wife,
03:07Nikki, about to rendezvous with the team of top scientists on that boat down there.
03:13Their mission? To understand what effect human-caused climate change will have on the storms of the future.
03:19Are you aware of the belt here?
03:21True.
03:43Tell us a fewences.
03:47Maybe?
03:48I see the
04:15Who wouldn't want to live here in Miami?
04:17It's beautiful.
04:20But is sea level rise something people here actually have to worry about?
04:24To find out, I've arranged to meet with a scientist named Karen Bolter.
04:28She lives in South Florida and says she'll give me the lowdown.
04:32Today she's introducing me to two of the top climate scientists in Florida, Ben Kurtman
04:37and Harold Wanless.
04:39So what are we looking at here?
04:41So here we go.
04:42This is what it looks like in 2030.
04:44Everything in red is going to be underwater.
04:47In 15 years, during the extreme tide in October, every high tide is going to be this high.
04:55That's just 15 years from now.
04:56Now let's look at 2060, high tide in October, areas that will be below sea level.
05:03It's uninhabitable.
05:05I can't believe what I'm looking at.
05:08Whole parts of Miami gone.
05:11I had no idea it could be this bad.
05:14And so soon.
05:15And you know, a hurricane in October is absolutely not unheard of.
05:19That happens here.
05:19So now you have sea level rise and storm surge.
05:22Think about how much flooding they're going to suffer during a major event.
05:25If a storm surge hit in 2060, this is what's vulnerable.
05:30Once the sea level is that high.
05:32Oh my God.
05:32And you're looking at less than 50 years in the future.
05:36I was in a movie called Water Worlds and it got really bad reviews.
05:41But now we can see that we were right.
05:44Can you show me on the map what the worst case scenario is for, say, 2100?
05:50The high projections for 2100 are 6.6 feet.
05:54When the tide is highest, everything in red will be underwater.
05:58Wow.
05:59Yeah.
06:00The entire county.
06:01There's no safe place.
06:03There's no more Miami.
06:05The port facilities compromised.
06:07The airports compromised.
06:09No fresh water resources.
06:11Also, you know, just because there's places that are above water,
06:15if there's no roads going to the place, it's essentially cut off from civilization.
06:20That's what we're telling communities to plan for.
06:23We're not just looking at South Florida.
06:26This is a proxy for all the coastal areas of the world.
06:29The Mumbai's, the Shanghai's, the Atlantic cities.
06:33There's going to be, like, massive migrations of humanity moving to different parts of the world just to survive, right?
06:40I mean, we're talking about...
06:41It's going to happen in the coming centuries because all of this carbon that we put into the atmosphere,
06:46it hasn't even started to make its impact.
06:49But there's such a time lapse.
06:50The big urgency is that every year we don't do anything, we're warming the ocean more.
06:55And it's that heat that's accelerating melting of ice.
06:58And that's the scary part.
07:00We need to start thinking about how we build and plan, not for the next five years, but for the
07:07next hundred years.
07:08I really had no idea that all the carbon dioxide we've emitted will continue to do damage for decades,
07:15raising the seas all around the world.
07:18What are the millions of people who live on the coast supposed to do?
07:28Just 40 miles from Miami, Nicky and I are about to embark on a week-long science expedition.
07:34Hi!
07:36As scary as hurricanes are to me, I've got to admit, I'm excited to be on this ship, the Aleutia,
07:43a state-of-the-art research vessel.
07:45Yes.
07:46Jeff, nice to meet you.
07:47Such a pleasure, man.
07:48Truly.
07:48You guys like to see the ship?
07:49Our host for the voyage is Jeff Donnelly.
07:52He's a top geologist with the famed Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts.
07:58Here's the submarines.
07:59We're going to be going down on these in a couple of days.
08:01There's Al in there.
08:02Hey, Al.
08:03This is Nicky.
08:04Hi, guys.
08:05We're going down on a submarine?
08:08Okay.
08:10I'm dying to know more about this mission and to see if there really is a connection between a warming
08:16planet and more violent storms.
08:18Here's the bridge.
08:19Okay.
08:21There's Captain Frank over there.
08:23Hi, Frank.
08:24Thanks for driving us.
08:27Many of the hurricanes that are impacting the United States are actually sort of tracking here through the Bahamas and
08:31past Cuba.
08:32This is Quesal Bank right here.
08:34This is where we're headed.
08:35And we're in this area specifically because...
08:38It's a submerged bank off the Florida coast.
08:41It has some really deep holes in it called blue holes.
08:44Well, these blue holes, they accumulate sediment through time that actually provides a record of past hurricanes.
08:49All this marine sediments getting washed in day in and day out and just accumulating this in this beautiful pile.
08:55That's just perfectly collecting sediment over time.
08:57Right.
08:58And so it's really well positioned to be sort of our weather station monitoring the hurricanes that have impacted North
09:03America.
09:04Going back hundreds and hundreds of years and even millennia.
09:06It's fascinating to learn that these underwater caves called blue holes actually contain the history of hurricanes.
09:15To reveal that history, Jeff explains that he drills long tubes into the sea floor.
09:21You're gonna lift it up and you're gonna put a cap on it.
09:23Fast as you can.
09:24Pulling up layers of mud.
09:27Let's get it up on the deck.
09:31Revealing the core sample inside.
09:33It's those strata that hold ancient clues about our future.
09:38Hurricanes are often related to sea surface temperatures.
09:41And so one of the concerns is that with the planet warming so much, we might see hurricanes getting much
09:46more intense.
09:46An increase in frequency or in intensity or both?
09:50We're sort of wrestling with that.
09:51It's those, you know, Cat 3, Cat 4, Cat 5 hurricanes that our computer models suggest will actually increase with
09:58global warming.
09:58So the data that you could be collecting here could tell us that we are heading into a new age
10:05of superstorms, basically.
10:07We could basically have a climate experiment that's run over millennium telling us when you get warm sea surface temperatures
10:12you should get many more very intense hurricanes.
10:15I like that, nature's climate experiment.
10:17Mm-hmm, that's right.
10:18So the short answer is yes.
10:20Yeah.
10:22Wow, that's Cuba.
10:23The blue hole we're gonna look at is right there.
10:27Has anyone ever done this work before?
10:30No, I mean, this is really hard to do.
10:32We're out in the middle of the ocean going into an area that's quite shallow, so you can't get a
10:36really large oceanographic ship in here.
10:39But yet when you get there, you have to core down 300 feet, so you need some significant pieces of
10:44equipment to do that.
10:46It's a really challenging place to work.
10:48If the weather doesn't cooperate, if a piece of equipment breaks, somebody gets hurt, it's possible that we could walk
10:53away with nothing.
10:55I can't believe I'm on this groundbreaking mission to explore a blue hole.
11:02We're going to look into the past to discover the future of hurricanes that could someday make landfall.
11:20As I ponder Miami's future, I can't help but notice how normal everyone's acting.
11:27Don't these people realize the city's on the verge of a major crisis?
11:32Already streets are flooding during some high tides, saltwater bubbling up from drains and making things miserable.
11:40But it seems that sea level rise isn't a priority for some of Florida's top politicians, like second term Governor
11:47Rick Scott.
11:48Officials in Florida's Department of Environmental Protection were banned from using the words climate change in official reports and communications.
11:56Scott's office denied there was a policy, but state workers seem to be dancing around the terms at a hearing.
12:03Future versions of our mitigation plan will be required to have language discussing that issue.
12:08What issue is that?
12:09The issue that you mentioned earlier regarding...
12:16So, are there any politicians here who are taking things seriously?
12:21Turns out there's one right here, in Miami Beach, Mayor Philip Levine.
12:26Good to see you too.
12:27We're all fighting against sea level rise.
12:29We believe that if we organize together, hopefully our voice will be that much louder.
12:34If there's a politician who can help save Miami, I gotta meet him.
12:43Mayor Levine, good to meet you.
12:46Welcome to Miami Beach.
12:48So, Mayor, what kind of things are you doing to prepare for what's, you know, what's coming and what's happening?
12:55You know, basically the sea level goes up, the bay goes up, and the water comes out of our drains
13:00onto our streets.
13:02So what we did right away is we immediately started putting in massive pumps under the ground to push the
13:08water back out to where it came.
13:09And we also began raising the roads.
13:12So, for example, the area you're in right now, you see how low we are.
13:15We've actually raised the street higher.
13:18Two years ago.
13:19That's what this is.
13:20Exactly.
13:21But what about down here?
13:22What about this?
13:22When it floods, this is not higher.
13:24There are drains around us where the water will go into.
13:27So we're lower.
13:28There's drains here.
13:29That's a higher street.
13:30This will not flood.
13:32We believe it's a good 40, 50-year solution.
13:35We're not raising them for today.
13:36This is for 50 years.
13:37This is a 50-year solution.
13:38Absolutely.
13:39But the forecast for Miami seemed to be pretty grim.
13:42I mean, they're talking about, you know, the end of the century, most of Miami being underwater.
13:47Well, I don't necessarily agree with those forecasts.
13:49I believe in climate change, and I believe it's human-made, and I believe that the seas are rising.
13:55Yeah.
13:55I'm not sure I believe in the very aggressive forecast put out there.
13:59Okay, but at this current pace of sea level rise, Miami will be submerged unless something drastic is done?
14:07Yes.
14:07I'm optimistic.
14:08I believe we can get it done.
14:10You know, one of our biggest obstacles, Jack, is that we have a state with a governor and a cabinet
14:15that doesn't believe in sea level rise.
14:17And they've turned a blind eye.
14:18Right.
14:18And they just say, you know what?
14:19We don't believe it.
14:20We don't think so.
14:21We don't see a sense of urgency.
14:22And we're trying to convince the governor to forget about politics and just understand that your streets are flooding, that
14:27you have coastal cities that need help.
14:32Mayor Levine may only be planning a few decades out, but at least he's trying.
14:37What about that governor, Rick Scott?
14:40Hi, this is Jack Black calling for Governor Scott.
14:44My Hollywood cred doesn't get me through.
14:48I appreciate it.
14:49And the best I can do is leave my number.
14:51Okay.
14:52Mission not accomplished.
15:14As we make our way toward the mysterious blue hole off the coast of Cuba, I learned there really is
15:22reason to fear more storms like Katrina.
15:26Baby, listen to this.
15:27In a 2012 study, a major finding was that Katrina-sized surges have been twice as frequent in warm years
15:35compared with cold years.
15:36That's crazy.
15:37That's what these guys are talking about.
15:39In a 2013 paper, Grinstead and his colleagues estimate, whoa, the doubling of Katrina magnitude events associated with the warming
15:48over the 20th century.
15:49Just the 20th century.
15:50Just the 20th century.
15:51That's crazy.
15:53The study concludes we have probably crossed the threshold where Katrina-magnitude hurricane surges are more likely caused by global
16:01warming than not.
16:20In the early daylight hour of the next morning, day three on the magnificent ship Aleutia, we're approaching our destination,
16:29the Blue Hole.
16:38I'm dying to see this underwater cave Jeff and his team have been talking so much about.
16:46Let's do this.
16:54It's actually a shallow water alarm sort of telling us that it's too shallow.
16:58I'm six under the keel.
17:00Six meters underneath the keel.
17:01I think we're okay.
17:02For the matter.
17:04Yeah, okay.
17:05I might come hard left and receive him right across it.
17:07Roger.
17:09Sorry, this is the wall right here.
17:12You can see the Blue Hole coming in there now.
17:15Okay.
17:15No problem.
17:17Dr. Donnelly?
17:18There's your Blue Hole, man.
17:33Would it really be possible to raise up the entire city of Miami to save it from big storms and
17:39sea level rise the way Mayor Levine wants to on Miami Beach?
17:43I decided to talk to another mayor, Phil Stoddard of South Miami to get his take.
17:50Mr. Mayor, I just came from a lunch with Mayor Levine and his solution seems to be, we'll just lift
17:58the city up.
17:59I'm going to lift up the streets.
18:00His plan will work for a while and it'll work on Miami Beach because Miami Beach has a very high
18:07income level per square mile.
18:09If you go out to West Miami-Dade County, the land does not generate enough income to do the kinds
18:14of projects that Levine is talking about on Miami Beach.
18:17There's just not enough money there.
18:18But is it even a realistic goal to say, let's lift the whole city up three feet?
18:23It seems insane to me.
18:25We don't have that much rock.
18:27Right.
18:27So if you elevate the roads, then your driveway is sort of going whoop like this.
18:31So you got to elevate your driveways and then you got to elevate your sidewalks.
18:34Then you might want to put some dirt in between them so people don't fall off.
18:37And then there's the fact that your house is down in a hole.
18:39So you got to start elevating the houses and schools.
18:42A couple trillion dollars later.
18:44And the hospitals and everything.
18:47I don't think we can afford it.
18:49What about further projections?
18:53What do you see Miami looking like in a hundred years?
18:56Waterworld.
18:58Waterworld.
18:58Waterworld?
18:58Yeah.
18:59It's funny you mentioned that.
19:00I actually had a small role.
19:03You wouldn't have recognized me.
19:04I was covered in Greece.
19:05But I still think we were on to something there.
19:08Yeah.
19:08I love that great sailboat here.
19:10Sorry to get off topic.
19:12What about sea walls?
19:14The solution of sea walls?
19:16Is that a problem for Miami is that we sit on top of a bed of porous limestone.
19:21And you know what's going to kill us?
19:22The shrimp.
19:23There's these prehistoric shrimp that dug in the sediments and made holes underneath us.
19:29The whole city is built on a foundation of Swiss cheese, basically?
19:34Yeah.
19:34A rocky version of Swiss cheese.
19:35You want to see a piece of it?
19:36Yeah.
19:36I got some out here in the yard.
19:38Yeah.
19:38I got some of it.
19:42So, Jack, this is the reason we can't keep the water out.
19:46This is Miami Formation limestone, and the water goes right through it.
19:50So this is the foundation that Miami is built on?
19:52You can build on it, but if you build a wall up on top of that to keep the water
19:55out,
19:56the water goes right through the holes.
19:57Right.
19:57It comes around underneath you.
19:58So, Mayor Levine says, don't listen to the doomsayers.
20:03Miami's here to stay.
20:04What do you think?
20:05This place is going to be underwater.
20:07We have enough heat in the atmosphere right now, enough heat in the oceans, enough carbon dioxide.
20:13Eventually, Miami will be underwater.
20:15It's just a matter of when.
20:16You got it.
20:17The sea level is going to rise, and Miami won't be here when it rises.
20:26We've arrived at the Blue Hole, just 50 nautical miles off the coast of Cuba.
20:31We're just approaching the drop off.
20:33We're watching that rolling under.
20:35Today, we go down inside it.
20:39Here we go.
20:40This is looking off.
20:41And we're off.
20:42Even though Jeff has cored many blue holes before.
20:45This is amazing.
20:46He's never been down to the bottom of one, because they're too deep to dive.
20:50So, this will be a first for both of us.
20:54It's a rocky little bastard.
20:56We'll go with no leaks.
20:58Okay, give permission.
20:59We'll be happy.
20:59Here we go.
21:03Ha, ha, ha.
21:05Okay, bridge, SO, lines are free or clear to maneuver.
21:09That's all this, Nadia.
21:11Bombs all clear in New Orleans.
21:12Roger that.
21:13Nadia, SO, you are clear to vent when ready.
21:17SO, SO, Nadia, venting now.
21:19Over.
21:20Roger, Nadia, venting now.
21:21Have you been back?
21:22Okay, here we go, guys.
21:23Yeah.
21:30Let's see if that's perfection.
21:31Oh, I love hearing that that's perfection.
21:34And the water for the hull is pretty much straight ahead, right off of our stern.
21:39At depth, 6-0 meters.
21:42Altitude, 1-7 meters.
21:44They're seeing a bottom at about 75 meters, about 210 feet.
21:47So, they're basically descending this wall.
21:52We are literally sinking into this giant blue hole.
22:14This is so beautiful.
22:16Nadia, Nadia, control my depth at 7 meters.
22:20Vents are secure.
22:21Coming up on the wall.
22:23Confirm descending to 2-0 meters on the wall.
22:33What is a blue hole?
22:36What is it that we're in right now?
22:37A blue hole is basically a cave that forms in a carbonate platform or limestone.
22:42The sea level has risen about 350 feet since the last ice age.
22:47It drowns it.
22:48So, you basically end up with a hole in the ocean floor.
22:50And that hole is just collecting sediments all the time.
22:52You can see it all around us, sort of, falling through the water column.
22:55That sand covers everything.
22:57It just blankets it.
22:58It's similar to a tree ring, putting on a new layer every year.
23:01So, it accumulates in the bottom.
23:03What happens when a hurricane strikes, it whips up some really big particles off the bank top
23:08and throws that in the hole.
23:09And then that's our record of the passage of that particular hurricane.
23:12So, by taking a sediment core in these blue holes,
23:14we can actually do a reconstruction through time of those hurricane events.
23:18It's a perfect time capsule.
23:20Yeah, time capsule basically starts when the sea floods this,
23:23probably about 8,000 years ago.
23:25So, we should have about 8,000 years worth of sediment accumulating in the hole.
23:28We probably won't be able to collect that much sediment.
23:30Yeah, we might get a few thousand years.
23:34Roger that.
23:35Coming down to the bottom, we'll sort of get a better visibility.
23:38I'm in 270.
23:44Almost.
23:45I don't think anyone's ever seen what we're seeing right now.
23:48It's really exciting.
23:49I mean, to be able to lay eyes on something that no human has ever seen before.
23:54It's amazing.
23:56Well, control, control.
23:57This is Nadir, off-bottom depth, 75 meters ascending, over.
24:03Thank you, Captain.
24:04Great maneuvering, man.
24:13That was a great scout.
24:15Now comes the hard part.
24:20Jeff and his team will try to drive these aluminum tubes deep into the ocean floor.
24:27The farther they go down, the more data they'll collect.
24:30But the more ambitious they are, the more often things can go wrong.
24:35The tubes can bend or even break.
24:46Okay, start your launch now, Cap.
24:48Launch away, launch away.
24:49Love you, Mike.
24:51Keep on going with all this stuff.
24:53Everybody's happy.
25:01All right, start her up.
25:06Nice and easy.
25:13We're not in the bottom.
25:14We're lying on the bottom.
25:18All right, stop it.
25:21I lost her right at the bottom.
25:28We're getting those muscles.
25:32Okay, that's the fiber core.
25:33It has the surface.
25:34She's got an angle there at the end.
25:36Hopefully, by the time she does, she's already going.
25:38Hi, Steve.
25:49As so often happens, the core is broken.
25:54And then it fell off while we were securing it.
25:59All the team can do is try again.
26:02All right, let's get another one going.
26:03But if anything more goes wrong, a big-time mission like this one could all be for nothing.
26:18I can't stop thinking of all the neighborhoods away from the glamour of Miami Beach.
26:23On the mainland that are going to be impacted by the rising oceans coming up through the porous limestone.
26:32Of the nearly three million people who live in the Miami area, more than half are lower income or immigrant.
26:39What are they going to do?
26:42I arrange a meeting with Nicole Hernandez-Hammer.
26:45Nicole?
26:46A scientist who left academia to work as a climate activist here.
26:51So great to meet you.
26:52What a gorgeous summer day in the middle of December.
26:56Yeah.
26:57We still got a little bit of flooding.
26:58Oh, yeah.
27:00Now, what's happening here?
27:01Is this water?
27:02This is high tide.
27:03This is just high tide?
27:04Yeah.
27:05And this is actually a foot less than last month.
27:07Crazy.
27:08Because I thought that maybe this was, like, leftover from rain.
27:11No.
27:11This is today.
27:12Wow.
27:13And no rain.
27:14It's really tough because I think sometimes people see the flooding and they think maybe a water main broke or
27:19it's just bad infrastructure.
27:20They're not making the connection between the climate change and what's happening here.
27:25Just to be clear, we're pretty far away from the beach right now.
27:28We're on the main line now.
27:29Miles away from the beach and yet water comes all the way here through the floor basically.
27:34Through the limestone, yeah.
27:36And it carries with it whatever is sitting on the surface and slightly underground like septic tanks or auto shops
27:43and whatever they've got coming out of their place.
27:45Yeah.
27:45And it collects.
27:46It's like biohazard stuff.
27:48Yeah.
27:48It can be toxic.
27:49It's got all sorts of bacteria and people don't know about it.
27:51So they're walking around in the water.
27:53Their kids are splashing in the water.
27:55It's a public health concern.
27:56Damn.
27:57And we're talking about people that have lived here their whole lives and it's probably tough for them to wrap
28:01their head around that, right?
28:02I think there's a certain degree of denial.
28:05Yeah.
28:05I think people feel like, you know, the elected officials or state agencies are going to figure it out.
28:13It can't possibly be that Miami's going to be underwater.
28:15Is the governor hearing your voice?
28:17Is there a movement in the...
28:19He heard it but he's pretending he didn't hear it.
28:22Right.
28:23A group of my colleagues had a meeting with him and he listened and then they left and then that
28:28was it.
28:29And nothing changed.
28:30Yeah.
28:32So, you can see the writing on the wall.
28:34What do you tell people in the community?
28:37Essentially, it's telling people that what we have here is going away.
28:40Right.
28:40And they could lose everything.
28:42But I'd like to introduce you to some people that I talk to.
28:45Hey.
28:46How's it going?
28:46Hey, how's it going?
28:47How you doing?
28:48Nice to meet you.
28:49Good, good, good.
28:50So, Nicole is telling me that sometimes the septic tanks can mix with the ground water and it can be
28:56like dangerous water.
28:58Has that ever been a problem?
28:59We're like two blocks down and it gets really bad.
29:02It gets flooded really bad and it sticks.
29:04I don't know if that's like gases or something.
29:06Right.
29:06And then it just smells really like bad.
29:10Tell the kids, don't go splashing in that water.
29:12No.
29:12Do you guys get worried because like the level of the ocean is just going to keep on rising and
29:16it's only like probably one foot away from actually water coming into your house.
29:20Are people concerned about Miami and like the future?
29:23Yeah, I mean, it's going to devalue the home eventually.
29:26People are going to come by and see it and there's no interest in buying a property like that.
29:36Is this really our future?
29:38One where eventually millions of Americans will have to move away from the coast?
29:44If that happens, where are they all going to go?
29:48Who's going to decide where they go?
29:51Who's going to decide where they go?
29:51And who is going to pay for it all?
29:57Hello?
29:58Hi.
29:59Yes, it's Jack Black calling again.
30:01I just wanted to talk to Governor Scott.
30:03I decided to call Governor Rick Scott one more time.
30:06You know, the one who apparently won't listen to his mayors or his scientists.
30:11It's regarding climate change.
30:14Okay, but what if, what if we, what if I say I don't, I wanted, I just want to talk
30:18about like weather difference.
30:22Does that make a difference?
30:23Because I know.
30:23Again, I don't get through.
30:26All right.
30:27He knows where to find me if he wants to call me.
30:31But I'm not going to hold my breath.
30:35This is insane to me.
30:37Miami's going under, but so many people are acting like nothing's wrong.
30:47I'm in awe at the number of people involved on this mission and the passion that they bring to the
30:52task.
30:53They seem tireless too.
30:54Real slow and steady for the last half of it, okay?
30:58Working from morning to night, all in the name of climate science.
31:02And even though they've come up empty so far, the team is determined to get enough core samples to make
31:07the trip to this blue hole worth the cost.
31:09All right, Chris, up easy.
31:12You happy now?
31:13I will be when we land this.
31:14Okay, so how do we make that happen?
31:17We're just about to.
31:18If this lands on deck, we will have just collected the longest core ever collected from a blue hole on
31:24Earth.
31:25Well, they're laughing.
31:26That must be something good.
31:32Oh, .
31:33Oh, .
31:34Oh, .
31:34It doesn't stop.
31:36Oh.
31:37Okay, let it go.
31:38We got it down.
31:39Okay.
31:46Came up by her fingernail.
31:53It's precious.
31:54We don't want to lose any.
31:55No.
31:56All right, everybody ready?
31:57One, two, three.
31:58Yes, family.
31:59Jeff will analyze this core back at Woods Hole to see when hurricanes occurred and how powerful they were.
32:06That's heavy.
32:07He'll also study how warm the sea surface temperature was.
32:11That's where Pete Van Hengstam comes in.
32:14What's up, Pete?
32:14Mind if I come in?
32:15He's a micropaleontologist and a key part of this team.
32:18Have a look.
32:19It's all set up.
32:20Wow.
32:20Take a whole little world in there.
32:22Look at these on the bigger screen.
32:24Essentially what you're looking at are millions of tiny shells that are being deposited into these blue holes.
32:30This is from the core drilling that you just did?
32:32Absolutely.
32:32These are the microfossils that were at the very bottom of that core.
32:36I'm still not completely understanding the climate connection.
32:39These organisms make their shells out of the mineral calcium carbonate.
32:43And when you form those shells, the chemistry of the shell is linked to the temperature of when that animal
32:49was living.
32:49How do you check the temperature?
32:51We can measure the ratio of the heavy to light oxygen atoms inside of these shells.
32:56And the relationship of that ratio is controlled by the ocean's temperature.
33:00We still need to radiocarbon date leaves that are preserved inside the cores to know how old all the different
33:07sediment layers are.
33:08Now I'm beginning to see the full picture.
33:10By analyzing the fossils as well as the mud they pull up from the sea bottom, these scientists can tell
33:16not just when a hurricane occurred, but how warm the water was at that time.
33:22So imagine if going back through time for a thousand or two thousand years, every single year we knew how
33:28many hurricanes made landfall and what the temperature of the ocean was like.
33:32Were there more hurricanes in the past? Was the ocean warmer?
33:35We're going to be able to learn so much about climate, how the environment in those holes change through time.
33:41That's just really exciting.
33:42So cool.
33:43Yeah, I mean, it's amazing.
33:44Well, we've got the mud and we've got the fossils.
33:49Now it's just a matter of what Jeff Donnelly is going to find out in his lab back in Massachusetts.
34:02Everywhere I go, I see construction cranes and new buildings going up.
34:08With sea levels rising, surely the developers in Miami are aware of the risk.
34:19Or are they thinking maybe people can just swim to the kitchen for breakfast?
34:26Hey, Jack.
34:27I asked an architect, Ronaldo Borges, and an insurance expert, Alex Kaplan, to meet.
34:32Insurance mogul?
34:33Something like that.
34:34Architect extraordinaire?
34:35Yes, sir.
34:36Great to meet you.
34:37I'm Jack Black, actor supreme.
34:39Let's have a seat, please.
34:43So, currently, how many new buildings are being built in Miami?
34:48Right now we have over 300 permits for significant high-rise, mid-rise construction.
34:53There's no slowing down in sight.
34:55Right now we have over $20 billion of new buildings going up.
34:59Unbelievable.
34:59That none of them really have been thought through in terms of permanent flooding.
35:03So, no one seems to be panicked about, hey, Miami's going to be one of the most severely hit places
35:10with regard to climate change.
35:12No, building increases.
35:15The builder, the city builders are sort of saying, okay, we're experiencing construction here that is unprecedented, with a lot
35:21of cash coming to Miami.
35:23Everybody's happy, and it's fantastic.
35:25Okay, now I get it.
35:27Real estate developers aren't concerned about the future.
35:30They're cashing in today while the getting's good.
35:33You know, in Florida alone, you've got $544 billion worth of property that lives within six feet of the high
35:42tide line.
35:42You know, it's right on the front line for sea level rise.
35:45Alex's company Swiss Re is an international insurance giant.
35:49They insure the insurance companies.
35:52Alex understands risk.
35:54The problem is, overwhelmingly, people, individuals, corporations, and governments underestimate what they're exposed to.
36:02I think the expectation is that, well, the government will come in and solve our problems, so why should I
36:05deal with it today?
36:07But flood insurance in the U.S. doesn't cover these things.
36:10Sea level rise over time? That's on the owner of the building.
36:13Nobody else is paying for that.
36:15At what point do you think people go, wait a second, it's not worth it anymore?
36:19These residential buildings get transferred from the developer into an association.
36:23If at a certain point the insurance company tells the association, we cannot insure your building because of the risk
36:28assessment,
36:28suddenly now they have a building that doesn't have insurance.
36:31You know, it's really scary to think that South Florida will not be insurable.
36:34So many people own homes. They have 30-year mortgages on them.
36:38You know, I'm thinking about how a lot of these towers are financed, right?
36:42It's entirely unsustainable.
36:46I get that no one wants this party to end.
36:50But when the insurance companies decide the risk is too high and the banks stop giving mortgages,
36:55this whole house of cards is going to collapse, right?
37:00I can't help wondering what will happen to everyone who lives here when all this property isn't worth anything.
37:14It's been a few months since I've seen Jeff Donnelly and his team.
37:18I'm a little anxious as I arrive at their lab at Woods Hole here on Cape Cod.
37:22I'm wondering, am I about to learn the worst about the future of Atlantic hurricanes?
37:30One of those cores that we took on the cruise, we split it open here for you so we can
37:33have a look at it.
37:34Wow.
37:36And so as you sort of march down this core, you're marching back through time.
37:40The entire core goes back a little over a thousand years.
37:43That's incredible.
37:44The base of this section is probably about 500 years ago.
37:47Europeans hadn't even settled North America when these sediments were being deposited.
37:51So Columbus doesn't arrive until somewhere at the upper end of this section here.
37:54If we date a whole series of those, we can actually build a really nice chronology of events.
37:59So question, you have consistency in the core, then you have these inconsistent patterns.
38:05These are events, right?
38:06Right. So these really coarse intervals here are what's being deposited during a hurricane.
38:10That's a hurricane?
38:11That's right.
38:12You go down a number of years and it's pretty quiet.
38:15Right.
38:15But then, all of a sudden, you get boom, boom, boom, one, two, three events within, say, ten years.
38:23That's right.
38:24This is incredible.
38:25So we've got one here at the base of this core.
38:27I can show you.
38:29This is probably one of the bigger event beds we have in this particular core.
38:32So here you've got really coarse debris and there's, you know, probably 10 or 15 centimeters of it.
38:36Something that large is probably a Category 4 or 5 hurricane.
38:40This is like a Katrina.
38:41Yeah.
38:41It could even be more intense than Katrina was.
38:43Hurricane after hurricane after hurricane.
38:45There was a lot of activity.
38:47That's right.
38:47Why?
38:48Well, it turns out that this particular interval is one in which sea surface temperatures are actually pretty warm along
38:53the eastern seaboard of the United States.
38:55And those warm sea surface temperatures actually caused much more hurricane activity.
38:59What this is showing us is that what the climate models are saying is really right.
39:03Hurricanes are really sensitive to sea surface temperature.
39:05And when you warm up the sea surface temperature even a little bit, you start getting more intense hurricanes.
39:10Is that where we're headed right now?
39:11Well, that's exactly the worry.
39:13There's this natural variability in the oceans and in the climate system that sometimes it was warmer, sometimes it was
39:18colder.
39:18But what's happening now is we've been warming up the sea surface temperatures with greenhouse gas emissions.
39:24The planet should actually be cooling right now.
39:26And it isn't.
39:27It's warming rapidly.
39:28We've shot past the warmest period in basically the last 450 years.
39:33So, by virtue of us heating the surface temperatures with water, we're already warmer than this was when we had
39:39this super violent, very, very active storms.
39:42That's right.
39:43Right.
39:44All right.
39:45Then we look more closely at one of these storms of the past to see what could be coming our
39:49way.
39:50This 1821 storm we actually know quite a bit about.
39:53So, you basically have a really fast-moving Category 3 hurricane going right up the eastern seaboard, right over New
39:58Jersey and New York City.
39:59That has been so destructive.
40:00Those sort of 1821 kind of storms that we're seeing in the cores, really big or really intense storms.
40:07Sandy, for example, we barely see any deposit.
40:10So, why was there so much damage from Sandy even though it was a minimal hurricane when it made landfall?
40:14And it turns out, you know, we're the problem.
40:16You know, this is basically what the New Jersey shoreline looked like when the 1821 hurricane hit.
40:21And you see that we didn't build anything on it.
40:22There's a few fishing shacks and that's about it.
40:25Right.
40:25This is that same stretch of shoreline today.
40:27We basically built Atlantic City, this urban area, on top of this barrier island.
40:33And then there's all this permanent infrastructure, whether it be hotels.
40:37Port facilities.
40:38Homes.
40:39All of this.
40:40Natural gas terminal.
40:41All that sits vulnerable to these storms.
40:43Imagine you're watching this big Category 4 hurricane spinning off of North Carolina.
40:48Literally 8-12 hours you'll have to make some really critical decisions about how to get people out of harm's
40:53way across this really heavily populated.
40:56But that's literally an impossibility.
40:58Right.
40:59Katrina, we had days and we still did a horrible job.
41:02Indeed.
41:05So that's what's really scary about these storms.
41:07We basically put ourselves in harm's way.
41:09In this harm's way.
41:10And as these waters get warmer, these storms are only going to become more frequent.
41:14Yeah.
41:15It's only a matter of time.
41:29The more I learn about Miami's fate, the less I'm able to wrap my head around it.
41:33Are we going to have to someday rename it the lost city of Miami?
41:39It's only a matter of time before a major storm hits.
41:42But it's been a decade and they've been lucky.
41:45So maybe that's part of the denial here.
41:48It's all making me feel a little crazy.
41:52I'm imagining that if I lived here in Miami, what would I do?
41:59What do you think you'd do?
42:01What we know is coming is sea level rise.
42:06Three feet, six feet, twelve feet.
42:09What is it that keeps me from really believing or wrapping my head around these facts?
42:16Here's your premise that's wrong.
42:18You are thinking that our brains are only rational.
42:22And they're not.
42:23Our brains are wired in part to deny unpleasant emotions.
42:29There is a part of our brain which is highly rational, analyzes data, takes in information.
42:35And then there's the emotional part of the brain.
42:38And the emotional part of the brain is extremely powerful.
42:41And it feels more comfortable just to, just to shut down the scientific part of my brain and just enjoy
42:50the right now, just do nothing.
42:52You are not alone.
42:54I have dubbed the condition pre-traumatic stress disorder.
42:58I am hearing what the scientists are saying in my mind, playing it like a tape all the time.
43:06I do.
43:06Now, was there a specific incident that heightened the sense of vulnerability and connected it with climate?
43:14I remember my parents fighting when I was a little boy.
43:20And I was so scared of their anger towards each other, I ran into a room with my nanny.
43:28Okay, that has nothing to do with climate change.
43:31Oh, but...
43:31That's just what came up. I don't know why, but that sense of fear and danger and instability.
43:38Right.
43:39It's just so unfathomable, the idea of change.
43:43So there's the tensions in that space while you're trying to find a peaceful resolution, you just kind of don't
43:52do anything.
43:55Do you think those are coconuts up there?
44:00What do you think they are?
44:07It's really hard for me to live with the fact that more storms like Katrina are headed our way.
44:13I wonder how Jeff and his team deal with it.
44:16You guys seem to be the holders of this knowledge, really specific to sort of our survival that not a
44:24lot of people know.
44:25How does that make you feel?
44:26I get frustrated with myself. That means I'm not doing a good enough job getting what we know out there.
44:31It's always a challenge that we talk our own language, we're good at talking to each other about it.
44:36But translating it into a language that everybody understands is much more difficult.
44:40For the earliest part of my career, I was like, well, as soon as New Orleans gets hit, society will
44:44get the message.
44:45Katrina happens, and I thought, okay, here it is.
44:47We got it.
44:48And nothing happened.
44:50All right, well, if New Orleans didn't work, the next time New York's hit, we'll get it.
44:53The East Coast gets pummeled.
44:54Sandy hits, the first thing we do is rebuild the Jersey Shore, right?
44:57We just don't get it.
44:58We don't sort of take that long view.
45:00That's the thing that keeps you up at night, right?
45:02Because you know you've got tens of millions of people in harm's way, and you don't know where the next
45:06one's going to hit.
45:08Isn't it frustrating, the lack of political will that we have in the United States of America to address this?
45:16Absolutely.
45:17It's the most frustrating part of my life.
45:20Of all of it, right?
45:20Right.
45:21You know, we're impartial observers, right?
45:23Scientists always come into it very skeptical.
45:26We're the most skeptical people on the planet, right?
45:27We're trying to understand how the Earth system works, and we sort of figure things out.
45:31You sort of put that message out, and it becomes immediately politicized, right?
45:34People think, oh, well, you're just trying to get more federal money.
45:37You're trying to get prestige.
45:38The reality is, if I could prove global warming wasn't real, I'd be the most famous scientist on the planet.
45:44I would have more funding than anybody.
45:46There's lots of incentive for me to disprove climate change.
45:49I can't do it, though.
45:51We're actually measuring it.
45:52We see it happening.
45:54And there's this war going on that has nothing to do with reality.
45:57And after living through hurricanes and seeing Katrina, and you guys living on the eastern seaboard
46:02in the most densely populated part of the country, aren't you as worried as I am?
46:07I guess I just don't believe in sitting around being afraid.
46:11Rather, like, trying to make measures towards changing it.
46:15No, I understand. For sure.
46:17And I don't feel doom and gloom, actually, at all.
46:20I feel empowered because I have that sense of wonder.
46:22I have that sense of excitement.
46:24We're innovative people.
46:26Why can't we make really good decisions about where we put infrastructure?
46:34Cheers, guys. Thank you for all of your energy and your time.
46:37The incredible amount of information I've learned today.
46:41And, Jeff, thank you for scaring me out of me.
46:44My pleasure.
46:56It's time for me to leave Miami.
46:58But before I go, scientist Karen Bolter thought I really should meet one other person.
47:04Someone who might hold a key to the future.
47:0717-year-old Delaney Reynolds.
47:09Delaney, nice to meet you. I'm Jack.
47:12Is it true I've heard that you are an incredible new force in the fight against climate change?
47:17Definitely, yes.
47:19I go around and I educate as many people as possible.
47:23But my main focus is kids because it's our generation that is going to inherit this problem.
47:29Like, all the kids that I talk to, they're like, yes, this is a problem and we need to fix
47:33it.
47:33And they get so engaged and they're like, I want help. How can I help? What can we do?
47:38That's so encouraging.
47:39It's really cool.
47:39So it seems like that's the trend with the youth movement.
47:44More and more people accepting what's happening.
47:47Unlike so many adults in leadership positions.
47:50Our governor has denied that climate change is real.
47:55And our senator denies that climate change is at all related to humans.
47:58That we have not caused this.
48:00And these are educated people.
48:02I like to say that I live in a state of denial.
48:05But not me personally, the entire state of Florida.
48:08Yeah.
48:10Wow.
48:11I mean, it's a world problem, right? It's not just a Miami problem.
48:15Yeah.
48:15Miami is number one in terms of vulnerability.
48:17So what we see here is going to get the whole world to wake up.
48:21For the survival of the species of human beings.
48:25Or will we become water world.
48:26Exactly.
48:27Where it's just me and Kevin Costner.
48:30On a little boat.
48:32Well, he was kind of like an Aquaman.
48:34He didn't need a boat.
48:35Anyway, it's an amazing movie if you get a chance.
48:37Thank you so much for this.
48:39This is really the highlight of my journey.
48:42Yes.
48:42Finally, I found some hope.
48:45But it's been amazing talking to you.
48:48Do you have any events coming up?
48:50Yes, actually.
48:51Part of a program called Breakthrough Miami.
48:53I'm going to give a talk to about 100 kids.
48:57I'm Delaney.
48:58I'm going to talk to you guys about my passion, which is global warming and sea level rise.
49:03The good news is there are things that we can do.
49:05Instead of using fossil fuels, we have technology like wind power and hydropower and electric cars and solar power.
49:13We just need to use it.
49:15So maybe Delaney and her generation will help us get out of this mess.
49:19If we work together, we can do this.
49:21I hope so.
49:23But they can't do it alone.
49:25When do we want it?
49:27When do we want it?
49:29When do we want it?
49:29They need people like Karen and Nicole Hernandez-Hammer and the rest of us.
49:34We are unstoppable! Another world is possible!
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