Hurricane Sandy flooded many acres of high-value developed real estate along the New Jersey shore. Now, scientists are pointing out a little-noticed fact: Before people built on it, a lot of that land was already wet. NBC News Science has this report: (“Superstorm Sandy exposes New Jersey mistake: Developing marshland,” by Becky Oskin).
Reports NBC: “When Hurricane Sandy’s powerful storm tide pummeled New Jersey, 70% of the state’s old submerged marshes flooded, researchers reported Monday at the Geological Society of America’s annual meeting in Denver. About 25% of those marshes were developed, and two-thirds of that development took place between 1995 and 2007, said Joshua Galster, a geomorphologist at Montclair State University in New Jersey. ‘A lot of these areas were being developed when we really should have known better,’ Galster said.”
