Will Florida Be Swallowed By The Ocean? Insights From Neil DeGrasse Tyson's Viral Post

Earlier in March, astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson published a post on X, formerly Twitter, which showed Florida and much of America's East and Gulf Coasts consumed by water. The post subsequently went viral, racking up 4.9 million views. The TV scientist noted that Florida was relatively flat, making it "supremely susceptible to sea-level rise during climate change." Many replies questioned the truth of the projection or climate change itself. So is Florida really going to be entirely consumed by the Atlantic Ocean as sea levels rise?

Tyson's map appears to be lifted from the September 2013 issue of the National Geographic, which considered what different continents would look like if all of the world's ice melted, causing 216 feet of sea level rise. It’s a startling visual that raises many questions about the future of coastal regions like Florida. As climate change progresses, understanding the implications of rising sea levels becomes increasingly vital.

The report noted that some scientists thought it would take more than 5,000 years for this to occur, though this scenario was likely if humans continued emitting greenhouse gases at current rates. If this were to happen, it wouldn't just be Florida that suffers; large swaths of South America would become sea, Denmark and the Netherlands would be reduced to a small set of islands, and most of Australia's population would have to be relocated.

David Thornalley, a professor of ocean and climate science at University College London, told Newsweek that this was "a very extreme example," but one that "would happen if we didn't take steps to reduce our GHG (greenhouse gas) emissions." In the long term, even under more moderate emission scenarios, sea level rise after a few hundred years is expected to be in excess of 10 meters (33 feet). So the picture Neil shows is not that far-fetched; it is simply that this scale of sea-level rise will take centuries to millennia to occur, assuming we don't lower GHG levels.

Florida 3ft sea level rise — Modeling of how Florida's coastline would look were sea levels to rise by 3 feet, with areas of new ocean denoted in blue.NOAA

How much of Florida is expected to disappear underwater is a matter of time and ice sheet loss, with the state's terrain dictating what remains. By the year 2100, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimates there will be between 43 and 84 centimeters (1.4-2.8 feet) of sea level rise, but said that an increase of two meters (6.6 feet) "cannot be ruled out."

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's projections, a sea level rise of around three feet would still see much of Florida's coastline—along with much of New Orleans in Louisiana—consumed by the sea. Key West to Homestead would be underwater, as would a large portion of Miami. Under six feet of sea level rise, all of Monroe County would be gone, while the coastlines around Cape Coral, St Petersburg, and Tampa would retreat significantly.

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