By Carol J. Bova

The Washington Post published a piece June 4, 2021, on the geologic origins of Mid-Atlantic summer destinations, many in Virginia. Its wrap-up switches into Woke doctrine and describes the Chesapeake Bay as “a case study in climate change…Efforts are on to mitigate the effects of rising water on islands in the bay and the cities and towns along it.” The article warns, “Climate change may have brought the bay into being, but now human-caused climate change endangers it… will the Chesapeake Bay itself cease to exist, subsumed by the Atlantic?”

Dramatic. Of course, there was no place for mention of the impact crater that provided the depression in which the Bay formed. The article refers to the melting glaciers of 10,000 years ago. No mention, though, that during each of the five Ice Ages going back to 2.4-2.1 billion years ago, glacial periods have always been followed by interglacial periods when the temperatures rise, or that we’re still in one.

Of course no mention of the land subsidence from the excessive drawdown of water in the Potomac and related aquifers by Virginia, D.C., Maryland, Delaware, and New Jersey. And certainly no mention of the role of that subsidence in relative sea-level rise in the Chesapeake Bay region, especially in Hampton Roads.

Instead of those inconvenient details, it was much easier to rely on the mantra of “human-caused climate change.”