Climate change could leave Chesapeake Bay island uninhabitable in 50 years

Effects of sea level rise hit close to home for Americans as US army corps of engineers report finds that Tangier Island is crumbling into the sea

You don't have to travel to a balmy Pacific island to hear the anguish of people whose land and culture is under threat from climate change. In Virginia's portion of the Chesapeake Bay, the idiosyncratic, and historic, community of Tangier Island is facing an uncertain future as the sea gnaws away at the land beneath them.

A bird's eye view of the island, just three miles long and one mile wide, would once have taken in a hook-shaped piece of land jutting out from the middle of the bay. The shape is more a teardrop these days, with erosion occurring at a bewildering rate.