Watch: Shocking footage shows 2 North Carolina homes claimed by rising seas

Climate Crisis by Jennifer Walter Updated: Feb. 20, 2024 Originally Published: May 13, 2022 NPS/Cape Hatteras National Seashore

Guglielmo Giambartolomei / EyeEm/EyeEm/Getty Images North Carolina’s Outer Banks is a popular tourist destination, home to wildlife preserves, beaches, and idyllic homes right on the water.

Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group/Getty Images But the region is especially prone to rising sea levels due to coastal erosion — and its residents are already feeling the shift.

NPS/Cape Hatteras National Seashore On February 9, a house in the unincorporated Outer Banks community of Rodanthe collapsed onto the shore after being battered by incoming waves.

This month, two more houses in Rodanthe were taken by the tide.

NPS/Cape Hatteras National Seashore

This video shared by National Park Service employees at Cape Hatteras National Seashore shows the first house after it collapsed.

NPS/Cape Hatteras National Seashore

NPS/Cape Hatteras National Seashore And this view shows the second house dramatically toppling into the water.

Thankfully, both homes were unoccupied at the time of their collapse.

But for other residents of Rodanthe — and those across the Outer Banks — the collapse might be an ominous sign of things to come.

NPS/Cape Hatteras National Seashore

NPS/Cape Hatteras National Seashore “Unfortunately, there may be more houses that collapse onto Seashore beaches in the near future.” David Hallac, superintendent of National Parks of Eastern North Carolina, in a statement

Michele Rinaldi / 500px/500px/Getty Images Every year, the sea level along the Outer Banks rises 5.3 millimeters on average — which doesn’t sound like a lot, but those small increments add up over time.

Here is the location of one of the collapsed houses in 1998. Notice how far it was from the seashore at this time.

Here’s the same house, from the same angle, in 2019.

Google Earth/Maxar Technologies

Human activities, like building jetties and groins, can erode beaches over time.

Jeff Carboni / EyeEm/EyeEm/Getty Images

Joe Sohm/Visions of America/Universal Images Group/Getty Images And communities in the Outer Banks are already working to combat the rising tides and increased flooding — which are likely to get worse as the climate warms.

Watch: Shocking footage shows 2 North Carolina homes claimed by rising seas

This month, two more houses in Rodanthe were taken by the tide.

This video shared by National Park Service employees at Cape Hatteras National Seashore shows the first house after it collapsed.

But for other residents of Rodanthe — and those across the Outer Banks — the collapse might be an ominous sign of things to come.

Here is the location of one of the collapsed houses in 1998. Notice how far it was from the seashore at this time.

Here’s the same house, from the same angle, in 2019.

Human activities, like building jetties and groins, can erode beaches over time.

Today, North Carolina has a ban on building these hard structures.

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