William Sweet, Joseph Park, John Marra, Chris Zervas, and Stephen Gill

NOAA Technical Report

Published date June 1, 2014

Sea Level Rise and Nuisance Flood Frequency Changes around the United States

  • Shows that water level exceedances above the elevation threshold for “minor” coastal flooding (nuisance level) impacts established locally by the National Weather Service (NWS) have been increasing in time
  • Documents that event frequencies are accelerating at many U.S. East and Gulf Coast gauges, and many other locations will soon follow regardless of whether there is an acceleration of relative sea level rise
  • Shows a regional pattern of increasingly greater event-rate acceleration as the height between mean sea level and a location’s nuisance flood threshold elevation decreases