Sea Level Rise, the Chesapeake Bay Bolide, and Managing Threats to Archaeological Sites in Coastal Maryland

Summary

This is an abstract from the "The Middle Atlantic Regional Transect Approach to Climate Change Impacts on Archaeological Resources" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

A study commissioned in 2015 by the St. Mary’s County, Maryland Historic Preservation Commission sought to measure the impacts of residential and commercial development on the county’s archaeological resources. The study’s findings revealed minimal impact by development but a stunning threat from sea level rise compounded by the land subsidence caused by a 35-million-year-old meteor event. Because these sites (identified and unidentified) are not threatened by development, resources are limited for documenting and managing them. To address this deficit in the state’s low-lying coastal plain, archaeologists might consider two things: one, a return to wide-area surveys using sophisticated GIS-based modeling and two, linking these surveys not only to climate change but to addressing important historical, social, and cultural questions.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• The Middle Atlantic Regional Transect Approach to Climate Change Impacts on Archaeological Resources

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25272