Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Results of USGS research investigating sea-level rise impacts to Department of Defense (DoD) facilities in Pacific atolls are included in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018.

This act, signed into law on December 12, 2017, authorizes and prioritizes funding for DoD military activities and construction. USGS scientists used Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands as a field site to fine-tune their computer models forecasting how rising sea-level and future storm waves will likely affect the sustainability of low-lying Pacific islands. The act reports their forecasts of flooding projected to threaten a major Air Force radar installation in the Republic of the Marshall Islands in upcoming decades.

Waves overtop the beach on the north side of Roi-Namur Island and water runs into the nearby street.
On March 2, 2014, 5-meter-high waves with 15-second periods struck Roi-Namur Island, Kwajalein Atoll, during spring high tides, causing the largest overwash event in the Republic of the Marshall Islands since 2008.(Credit: Peter Swarzenski, Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center. Public domain.)

Get Our News

These items are in the RSS feed format (Really Simple Syndication) based on categories such as topics, locations, and more. You can install and RSS reader browser extension, software, or use a third-party service to receive immediate news updates depending on the feed that you have added. If you click the feed links below, they may look strange because they are simply XML code. An RSS reader can easily read this code and push out a notification to you when something new is posted to our site.