Sea-Level Change in the Gulf of Mexico
Publication Year: 2011
Published by: Texas A&M University Press
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People in the early civilizations recognized that sea level has changed over time. Stories in ancient Greek and Hebrew described great floods of the sea. The presence of fossils and huge boulders well above present sea level were used as evidence. Much later, in the seventeenth century, Neptunism was prevalent among scientists. This theory held that there was a major ...
Chapter 1--Causes and Rates of Sea- Level Change
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Changes in sea level can occur locally along as little as hundreds of meters of coastline, regionally across hundreds or thousands of kilometers, or globally; all may be important. Global sea- level change is generally referred to as eustatic change. It is eustatic or global sea level that the world’s population is concerned with at the present time. The rates of change in ...
Chapter 2--Sea-Level Changes in the Early Historyof the Gulf of Mexico
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The Gulf of Mexico is relatively young in the history of the earth, yet it is still more than 150 million years old. Its origin is associated with plate tectonics as crustal plates moved thousands of kilometers. At times during its development, sea level in the Gulf of Mexico has been very high as well as low compared to the present. The history of this basin exhibits a lot ...
Chapter 3--Sea-Level Changes During Glacial Times
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Glaciers are large masses of moving ice. They can be small such as those in the mountain valleys in the Alps and Alaska or they can be very wide-spread such as those covering most of Greenland and Antarctica. These very large glaciers are know as ice sheets, It is these ice sheets that have the potential to change sea level as they grow and melt. The East...
Chapter 4--Melting Ice Sheets and Sea-Level Rise
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The maximum glaciation of the late Wisconsinan stage of the Pleistocene Epoch occurred about 20,000–22,000 years ago. As these ice sheets melted, sea level in the Gulf of Mexico and throughout the world began to rise from a low of about - 130 m relative to its present position (Fig. 4-1). The rate and direction of sea- level change from initiation of the rise 18,000 years ago ...
Chapter 5--What Is Happening Now?
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The previous chapter concentrated on the development of coastal morphology and environments as sea level rose after the ice sheets began to melt. This rise in sea level began about 18,000–20,000 years ago. This chapter will deal with the present situation along the Gulf Coast. Here the “present” is defined as that period from the beginning of historical time up until ...
Chapter 6--What Is Next?
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This chapter deals with the future. Three aspects of what will take place along the Gulf of Mexico coast must be considered. This discussion will be aimed at the turn of the next century, the typical time frame for most of the published predictions. First and foremost, what will be the position of sea level at the year 2100? Then, what is the impact of that sea- level ...
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Page Count: 192
Illustrations: 65 color photos. 48 maps. 39 figs. 3 tables. Index.
Publication Year: 2011