'Moon wobble' could cause flood surge: NASA

'Moon wobble' could cause flood surge: NASA

U.S. coastlines will face increasing flooding in the mid-2030s thanks to a regular lunar cycle that will magnify rising sea levels caused by climate change, according to research led by NASA scientists.

Gavino Garay has more.

U.S. coastlines could face increased flooding in the 2030s – and the culprit?

A phenomenon NASA calls a ‘moon wobble’, mixed with rising sea levels caused by climate change.

A key factor identified by NASA scientists is a regular "wobble" in the moon's orbit - first identified in the 18th century - that takes 18.6 years to complete.

The moon's gravitational pull helps drive Earth's tides.

The alarming prediction pushes previous estimates for serious coastal flooding forward by about 70 years, the study showed.

NASA’s ‘Sea Level Change’ Team Lead Ben Hamlington explains the prediction.

"So in the coming decades, as sea level continues to increase from global warming, and it's increasing across the globe, the combination of sea level rise associated with global warming and then natural drivers of sea level variability, so the things causing sea level to go up and down just naturally in the ocean, are going to combine to cause coastal flooding.

And what we found is that this increase in coastal flooding is really going to be increased significantly in the coming decades, specifically in 2030 to 2040." Hamlington says the study should be “eye-opening” and cautioned that city planners should prepare accordingly.