Why UK Towns are Being Erased From the Map
Вставка
- Опубліковано 13 тра 2024
- Want to restore the planet's ecosystems and see your impact in monthly videos? The first 200 people to join Planet Wild will get the first month of your subscription for free at www.planetwild.com/faultline/...
If you want to get to know them better first, check out their latest video here:
- Planting 40,000 trees in Senegal to overcome desertification: www.planetwild.com/faultline/9
The village of Hemsby on the east coast of England could be the latest in a line of settlements that have been lost to the sea. Andy and Mack travelled here to spend time with residents who are literally living on the edge and believe that they and their homes have been abandoned by the authorities.
Subscribe and turn on notifications 🔔 so you don't miss any videos: / faultlinevideos
You can support the residents of Hemsby at: savehemsbycoastline.org.uk/
JOIN OUR PATREON
/ faultline
Short form content //
/ faultlinevideos
/ faultlinetv
Business enquiries // contact@faultlinevideos.com
Faultline is produced by:
Executive Producer/Story Editor/Host: Andy Burgess
Story/Research: Mack Mooney & Andy Burgess
Senior Producer: Anjali Sharma
Editors: Tom van Kalken & Andy Burgess
Motion Graphics: Tom van Kalken
Cinematography: Andy Burgess
Production Assistant: Mack Mooney
Consultant: David Demeritt
Additional Drone footage by: Luke Martin Photography
Special thanks to Simon Measures, Kevin Jordan and the people of Hemsby.
Music from Musicbed // fm.pxf.io/c/2423499/1347628/1...
Sources 🔗
opendomesday.org/book/norfolk...
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england...
www.bgs.ac.uk/news/hemsby-coa....
tourismteacher.com/hemsby-bea...
www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/de....
coastal.climatecentral.org/ma...
www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/de....
www.greatyarmouthmercury.co.u...
www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...
www.geoffreywatling.org.uk/
www.greatyarmouthmercury.co.u...
www.bbc.com/travel/article/20...
www.great-yarmouth.gov.uk/art...
www.environmentandsociety.org...
www.theb1m.com/video/the-sea-...
www.theguardian.com/environme...
www.politico.eu/article/uk-ri...
www.bgs.ac.uk/news/hemsby-coa...
Time Stamps:
0:00 Welcome to Hemsby
1:29 The history of Hemsby
2:53 October Storms & the Journey to Hemsby
4:24 Why people still live in Hemsby
5:53 Hemsby's coastline, explained.
7:31 Hemsby's lost homes
9:30 Storms and Rising Sea Levels
10:41 Why authorities don't cares about Hemsby
13:34 Tourism in Hemsby (or lack of)
15:04 I found Hemsby's 'missing' MP
15:56 Defending Hemsby from the Sea
18:40 The Netherlands vs the UK
19:47 What the world can learn from places like Hemsby
20:40 Epilogue
#geography #coastline #UK
Thanks for watching guys. Let us know of other places that are facing a similar threat that you would want us to cover.
pontins hemsby is demolished
Scituate, Massachusetts. It's been losing beach width and dunes for several years now.
Please don't make any more of these dreadful one-sided, biased and uninformative videos.
Withernsea, east Yorkshire.
This was the first time I had watched your channel and found brilliant please carry on your work if you have app called plain finder load it up you’ll be heart broken to find the amount of air craft In our skys it’s a mass of white all over the U.K. and Same all over world then their amount of bombs and distraction around the world it needs to stop
“You don’t qualify for funding, but we’ll do everything we can to help you when you lose your home.” That’s insane!
Insurance Vs investment.
It politics.
One is an easier sell.
It’s the same if you are in rented accommodation anywhere. Their responsibility only starts when you are homeless.
Not really. With the history of erosion that swamped those communities now in the ocean and only a little over 3000 people sitting on private property essentially living all year in seasonal 2nd homes the community should be condemmed, all houses destroyed and everyone resettled procatively and end this nonsense once and for all.
They are free to move from their private property to somewhere else. Although there’s more behind it. Oh no, they are just caravan and holiday parks not normal housing.
Why should other people's tax pay for what was a prior known issue so these people can have a nice view from their window?
Around much of the Scottish coast the land is, slowly, rising up out of the sea and there are many raised beaches around the coast. This is happening because the land is still springing up after the weight of ice sheets from the last ice age melted. There are localised areas of coastal erosion but the eroded land is normally dumped to form new areas of land further along the coast.
Scotland is a much older and in Rock terms Harder(Granite) while most of England is soft Rock (Limestone and Sandstone)
Harlech castle was located by the sea when built, but has since retreated. Food for thought for all the "climate change" sensationalists out there
@@mikw1809 No it isn't, it is a straw for afraid conspiracy theorists to cling to. Parts of the coast erode, other parts receive the material that was lost from the eroded areas, that doesn't mean global sea levels aren't rising, you mysteriously afraid fool.
There are tens of thousands of meteorologists and climate scientists who have looked at the data and concluded that climate change is responsible for the erosion around the world, warmer temperatures, more intense storms, more rain, etc. But, thank you for giving us just one example to "prove" your point. Try contacting the lobstermen in Southern New England who have seen their catch diminish because of warmer waters or the residents of Louisiana, particularly their islands which are quickly disappearing or the coasts of Alaska where communities are forced to move inland or the increased temperatures around the world, the vanishing glaciers in the Alps, the Himalayas and other mountain regions. Don't forget to research the salt water encroaching on fresh water supplies in Florida and in coastal areas around the globe. But, again, thank you for sharing about Harlech castle. @@mikw1809
As you point out, the Norfolk coastline has been eroding for 5,000 years. Not just the 200 years since the Industrial Revolution, funnily enough. And as others here have commented: Whenever new, resilient sea defences are implemented at one town, they appear to have a knock-on negative effect upon another town's coastline.
Tricky.
My Grandparents lived there back in the 1980s. They moved away when the sea defences at Winterton (just up the coast) were constructed because they felt that this will happen. They lived up at the Glebe which is behind the slide you see by the coast (that is looking from the coast). I had many great holidays there visiting in my teens.
You’re bang on sir
The issue isnt that the coast has been eroding since the last Ice age ended (or therabouts) its that its eroding MUCH FASTER because of climate change.
That's why the Netherlands has implemented ministry and water management areas that have their own financial and political power.
They are separated from the Dutch government to prevent these kind of negligence.
@hunchanchoc8418, exactly it's the old nomenclature game with the words, climate change. The climate's been changing since the dawn of time. Long before the industrial Revolution. Sure there's climate change but mankind is not the primary culprit. Look to Mother nature and our sun's phases especially the solar minimums and maximums that greatly affect Earth's storms and other weather. People don't know historical weather patterns or much about meteorology and natural science.
At Great Yarmouth in Norfolk, the sea is now 200 metres further out than it was in the 1960s, the pier now never has water under it. This is opposite to what we are being told.
Much of the coastal erosion and the Great Yarmouth extra depositing is caused by dredging to accommodate larger ships and that changes tidal flows.
Castle Harlech built at the sea 741 years ago, is now 2 miles (3218 metres) inland. That's 4.3 metres per year that the sea has retreated. I think the agenda is to tax our existence and "climate change" sensationalists are creating the justification for it
Climate change, climate change. Yes it's changing, it's always changing. The Sun, the largest contributor to climate change has just switched its magnetic polarity, something that happens cyclically. As a result and along with the normal solar cycles as we do not go around the Sun in a perfect circle, we are about to go into a cold era, which will be evident by 2035. Cold actually makes storms worse. Most flooding is down to the stupidity of planners building on flood plains.
Yes, these issues are more complex than the video makes them out to be.
My old flatmate was from Great Yarmouth. He didn't have too many great things to say about it, but I think he just had a rough childhood. East Anglia with its lowlands and broads is simply a bit different from many areas of coastal Britain where the sea has been attacking cliffs for millennia.
I briefly lived in Cambridgeshire as a foreigner. That was my tenth year in Britain and I've not been back since. It was becoming an increasingly unfriendly nation and the anti-immigrant sentiment exploded into Brexit soon after I left. I'm a highly educated white American and noticed it. I was hardly the primary target of all that ire.
I send kind greetings to beautiful East Anglia. It will outlive all the current mess that Britain has heaped on itself.
@@ems4884 Undemocratic European authoritarianism "exploded into Brexit".
@@grahambennett8151 Not to mention the thing that helped Brexit was the issue of illegal immigration, including the explosion of knife crime in London, a series of terrorist bombings and gang rape from the particular ethnic group in question.
The French aren't helpful, they are apparently ferrying these migrants to the shores where they get into rubber dinghies which have to be bought somewhere, which aren't suited for carrying that many people across the channel and because of ECHR, it forces us to rescue them but when they commit crime we simply can't punish them.
None of these politicians actually care, they like posturing more than fixing the core systems and making life better for everyone.
Déjà vu?! We need your help. Sadly we had to re-upload this video which is not ideal. We spent 2 months reporting on this story and have put in a huge amount of time and effort in bringing it to you all. The way the platform works is when a video is released, it first shows it to our core audience and if you choose to click on it and watch a large portion of it, only then it’s pushed it out to a wider audience. We believe most of you guys, our core subscribers reading this in the first few hours/days, have likely already seen the video and thus might click away.
The biggest way in which you can help us and amplify this story is by watching it again, and then, engage with it as much as you can - every like, comment, and share is incredibly helpful. With the help of the people in Hemsby and their trust in our platform, we believe we have produced a really great documentary on the issue and we want to give it the best chance of success.
If you made it this far thank you for reading and supporting our work and we hope you enjoyed the video.
🙏
I knew that had to be it. When I saw it yesterday I thought it was criminal how little views in brought in for how much work yall did. I hope it does better this time!
One thing I would point out is UA-cam don't like re-uploads either, and doing it on the regular will hurt the channel.
rewatching the whole thing!
I will rewatch this time, but I think it’s fair to tell people why you had to reupload.
I've seen videos that were criminally low in views suddenly weeks or months later get picked up by the algorithm and get from 4 digit to 6-7 digit views, I can only hope yours will be one of those because this video and your other ones definitely deserve 7 digit views for sure. I will watch the whole video again today.
I'm from just down the coast from Hemsby and we also lost homes and part of a road to sea a couple weeks ago. Pakefield beach has been almost washed away. I walk there every morning and often take photos. The change in the last 6 months has been happened so quick, with a big noticeable difference. I'm shocked by the lack of government help to protect our coastline and the home alone it.
Our government never plan ahead as it would cost money, so they wait till it breaks and pay a relative an absolute fortune to fix it...might even give em a knighthood while they're at it.
You want them to go and fucking prop the entire cliff face up with steel beams or something? Create ugly, mile long sand dunes that will get swept away instead and need to be topped up every few years? In all honesty it's more concerning the government went completely batshit stupid and let people live this close to the cliffs. This shit has been happening for centuries and only after the 40s did the government start letting people just prop up entire new communities next to an ever changing cliff face or river
I used to work in Lowestoft at Broadland Sands, I left in November and my friend has just gone back for the weekend and even she said that so much of the rocks have fallen even just in a couple of months
I'm shocked that you believe the government can beat nature.
It's a natural process, no point is wasting money trying to fight nature.
I hope everyone watches this again. This is the kind of content I wish more journalists pursued, I know that it will never be as popular as hot button topics.
But, when discussing climate change or war it’s stories like this where we see practical, real world examples of what these larger topics look like. It’s the kind of thing that made VICE News so interesting early on and I should say Faultline is doing an exceptional job at that.
It's not really climate change. If you live by a river the same shit happens. The river moves, the cliffs erode. They're not something that stays forever and these settlements have been there for god knows how long. Some from well well before the 19th century and others set up right on the fucking cliffs getting upset when storms come along every year and the weak stone cliffs, chalk and softer variety's, collapse. The government here are fucking idiots. They allow you to build multi millions worth of homes by a constantly changing river or cliffside but if you put up a shed they'll fucking be on your ass over every little aspect of your own garden. I live in a valley of lowland Scotland. For time immemorial the rivers go up and down, the towns along then that were stupidly given the green light for council homes by the river get flooded almost every year. This wasn't an issue before the war, because before the war these places weren't allowed. They were reserved for farms where flooding would be detrimental to crops and livestock but not thousands of people and hundreds of thousands in property damage.
The climate changes four times a year so they’re not lying 😂
H.A.A.R.P
I didn't know about all the extra stuff surrounding the council and the local MP, but I'd heard of the group trying to save the place. Great video guys!
I just want to say a few things about Hemsby
I used to visit Hemsby with my family for holidays every year. It really was a stereotypical British seaside town, and over the last 15 years it's changed massively. About 7 years ago there was a noticeable difference in the beach between the visits that we had (previous year: flat and sprawling, following year: the entrance to the beach was about 1m higher than the beach itself) however; this didn't seem to effect tourist number all that much as the beach was still accessible. My family and I would even walk down The Marrams to nearby Caister during our visits.
There is a couple of things I'd like to add to this that weren't mentioned in this video:
1) The red building next to the short stay car park opposite the Marrams is an RNLI station. I assume that they aren't operating out of there anymore and have moved their boat and crew to another station that still has access to the sea close by, but I am uncertain of this.
2) When a bit of shoreline is eroded it has to go somewhere, and in this case it seemed that it went further south, down to Great Yarmouth. As (during the same visit I mentioned earlier) we noticed that the pier at Great Yarmouth had significantly more sand under it, and a lot less sea.
It's a shame to see this happen, but it is unfortunately a consequence of the area and it's geology and geography. Also as I've had such fond memories of the place growing up. Maybe one day I'll take children of my own down there and tell them how it once was, but it's unfortunately looking like it's borrowed time for that to happen.
To anyone that made it this far: thanks for reading my comment on my connection to the place.
Good points, but also to mention that the construction of Great Yarmouth outer harbour appears to have caused the erosion of Hopton Beach, though this has been denied. So I do have to wonder what else might have caused the similar deposition of sand at Hemsby which built the dunes in the first place, to go into reverse.
This is terrible. A similar thing happened here in Denmark and my grandma was living in one of the affected areas, but her insurance paid her and her neighbors out so they could move.
Jullie Denen zijn ook niet de slimste hè, jullie moeten met een helm op fietsen omdat je bang bent dat je valt en je weet niet eens hoe je een dijk moet bouwen. Waarschijnlijk kan je dit niet eens lezen ook nog.
@@gaudetjajaJe hebt het buskruit ook niet uitgevonden. Je hebt geen idee waar je het over hebt.
@@gaudetjaja IIk kan het lezen, al was het '51 toen wij naar de UK emigreerde. Dijken worden in Nedeland gebout waar het zich loont. In the Fenland en North Lincolnshire ziyn er dijken genoeg, de engelse weeten wel hoe. Maar de hele kust van Lincolhshire tot de Thames te beschermen? Nederland zou daar ook een beetjy over nadenken.
these people literally choose to live here in the last 10-15 years, knowing full well the risks it entailed. No taxpayer money should be spent on these whinging fools. All of these communities should have all taxpayer funding withdrawn, and the land should be compulsory purchased at low market rates and then the residents resettled. Its ridiculous spending more and more money to prevent something which can never be stopped - the coast is erroding, its a stupid place to live.
In Nederland graven ze tegenwoordig stukken uit de duinen, de HELE kustlijn, om het drinkwater te laten verzouten en het achterland (hopen ze waarschijnlijk) te laten verzuipen en verkassen naar het oosten.
You covered so much in this film and captured many of the issues we are trying to solve from many perspectives. I’m a researcher in this field, my focus is in North Norfolk but I often go to Hemsby at weekends and I’m working hard more generally to help find long term solutions to the inevitable changes we face. Thank you for making this film.
What on earth were you watching? 'from many perspectives'?
It’s funny to me that all these places that are being eroded heavily are all places that aggregate dredging happens out at sea. This information is easy to come across with a google search for sea dredging maps but no one is talking about it and we are just told that it’s a natural process.
Bacton is 18 miles north of Hemsby, further along the same coastline. It too is suffering coastal erosion.
However, the Bacton Gas Terminal is based there, to receive gas from Europe.
I am sure coastal sea defences will be built there, as that site is part of the UK's Critical National Infrastructure.
I'm from Birmingham, I love travelling around the UK mostly for hiking and camping but I'm going to add Hemsby to my list of places to visit. Not necessarily for the beach, I'll buy some food, pay for parking and check out a place that needs a bit more attention.
Thanks for this, very interesting! Im originally from Guernsey, Channel Islands. We get battered too. But thats just nature. Apart from that our beaches are empty (compared to the good old days when Guernsey was a holiday destination until the late 1970s - as Hemsby used to be), our beaches are all still in the same place. Cos Guernsey is made mostly of granite and we build a lot of our houses with granite. Not flimsy wooden bungalows on a sand dune. The problem with Hemsby is its coastline. Its just not made to last.
Put your foundations on rock not sand.common sense,...
And now, sadly, those homes have gone. Great video and editing
Great that you are giving these people a voice. Good job 👏🏼
Yet in Spain, Mums beach has widened a good 20 metres out to sea and Roman ruins have been uncovered from the original sea line, buried by the sea for hundreds of years.
I used to go to Hemsby when I was a kid in the 70s and later worked on Pontins site in the 90s. I have been back during the last couple of years and its truly astounding to see how close the sea has come inland.
Answer: Don't build nearly in the sea! This happens all over the world.
Never been to the Norfolk coast. But I even remember as a child (40 something years ago) that the Norfolk coast was a very popular holiday destination in the 70s/80's & into the 90s. My mum even knew people back in those days who loved it so much they moved there. To see it all lost is tragic. I will visit one day. It's been on my places to go list for a while now. I think what's happening does put me off a little. But Norfolk always looks absolutely stunning. Thank you for sharing this
It seems like the good people of Norfolk could use another Sand Engine. It uses natural currents to grow beaches and strengthen the coastline using an artificial sandbank, which has also recreational purposes. It works fine in the Netherlands and it's much cheaper than traditional coastal defences.
I'm not a geologist or geographer by any stretch, but as someone that used to go there regularly: it seems that the sand from Hemsby has ended up at Great Yarmouth as the beach there grew massively around the same time that it shrank at Hemsby
You have to be careful with things like this. See how Hopton beach has been washed away since the Great Yarmouth outer harbour was built.....and see how the beach further down the coast is actually being built.....in Great Yarmouth, the pier is no longer in the sea and the sea wall is a long long way back from where the sea actually is.
A great piece of journalism. Keep up the good work. I hope the people of hemsby get a salvation, and soon.
True, assume that the sea currents go south to north. Built a large sand engine just south from the area were coastal erosion is a thing. Problem solved or at least made 80-90% less urgent. Unbelievable that British polticians and civil servants don't understand this. They must be stupid.
Wow, very insightful story. The timing also proved to be impeccable, makes it feel almost documentary level quality. Great video you guys keep raising the bar
This is my first time watching the channel but this has been an incredibly informative and captivating watch! I love the genuine perspectives of real people and how you explore all angles of the information
One possibility that wasn’t mentioned was Doggerland. Both sides of the North Sea are still experiencing crumbling and sinking. One gigantic sinkhole? 🤔
Its coastal erosion nothing more
@@garrymartin6474 which is how Doggerland / Doggerbank disappeared. Are you a geologist?
@@Sawk_KingDoggerland disappeared at the end of the last ice age when the sea level rapidly rose by ~500ft.
These wooden shacks are falling into the sea because they're built on eroding sand dunes, rather than solid land.
There's no mystery here.
I love the way you edit and report on things!
This is a nightmare for these poor people. I can’t believe how many towns have just vanished off the map. As a coastal dweller in the US, I’m blessed that I’m far enough back from the cliff that I still have the view, but not the danger. Other than hurricanes. But it’s been 135 yrs. Since we had a hit. Just so sorry.
This is happening in a fair few places across the east coast, Happisburgh is also falling into the sea fairly rapidly. It's always happened here, a lot of the towns and villages he mentioned went to the sea quite a while ago. The difference is it's never happened close to as rapidly as it is now. And back when those other towns went, we didn't really have the knowledge or resources to stop it. We do now and our govt just doesn't give a shit.
Excellent video. Mother Nature is a foe you can't beat. Such a shame for these people.
Unless you're Dutch
No great loss
Swallowed by the sea, great video, are you going to make one about the large areas of land in the Uk , Europe and globally that have appeared due to the sea receding over the last 1000 years?
@glenreddy1435 ... I didn't know that, where in the UK has land appeared please, I'm really interested?
@@Tidybitz Hi, there are many areas of coastline around the Uk where the sea has retracted, for example Pevensy castle, built as a sea defence castle, now several miles inland.
One area which will certainly entertain any budding historian, is “The American Corner “ an area of land in Hastings East Sussex, where the sea retracted, and an American claimed, and held the land , as an additional state of the Americas, until several years later the, the king decided enough was enough and took the land back under English sovereignty. This area is full of shops, restaurants and bars plus residential housing now days.
Also look up the changing maps of the cinque port towns . Good luck.
@@glenreddy1435 ... Thanks for that info.
@@glenreddy1435 I think they did touch up on that when the fella explained that even without climate change we'd see some level of this because the north is effectively rising and the south is sinking.
@@ItsSpecialHands Hi there, thank you for your comment, real truth I’m trying to point out is, there is no such thing as “without climate change”, as climatic changes are constant, since the dawn of time , the planet experiences noticeable shifts in short periods of time, and anything up to 5000 years, is a short period of time.
There is no evidence that we are experiencing anything out of the normal. If you compare change, to the lifespan of the average human it will , look very different than if you compare over a 1000 years, something most climate change experts refuse to acknowledge, you will form a much different picture.
Don’t forget the whole of the Uk was under a 3 mile thick ice glacier around 8000 years ago, the Sahara Desert was a rain forest at around the same time, Gobekli Tepe was a thriving civilisation 12000 years ago, in that short period, you wouldn’t recognise the planet today, especially if you focus on sea levels.
I’ve seen maps from the middle ages. Large swathes of land in somerset, norfolk, suffolk, lincolnshire, essex, kent and hampshire were under the sea or tidal swampland. The sea returning to these areas is resetting the status quo.
A map of the Ice Age will show that everything in the North Sea used to be dry land. Your point?
@@Conclusius68 i have seen copies of the mediaeval maps. Show me the contemporaneous maps from the Ice Age , dear, then you would have hard evidence to back up your conspiracy theories.
@@lulabellegnostic8402Just get your Google out and google Dogger Land. The North Sea was mostly dry land because the water was contained in huge glaciers. Not a conspiracy, just science.
It was more than well known 14yrs ago that these places were/would be lost to the sea. Why tf would you move there 14yrs ago!!!?
I recall happy family holidays at Hemsby when our kids were of primary school age. The eldest is now a head of faculty at a secondary college, the youngest an accountant with the NHS. WE ALL REMEMBER HEMSBY as a vibrant family friendly place with a great beach. So sad it is being allowed to succumb to uncaring administration. Subscribed!
It’s sad to see the second dune no longer! Spent many summer holidays in Hemsby playing amongst the dunes as a child… for the most part these were just holiday homes, the older buildings are pretty much sheds, some of which had outside toilets and showers.
And yet people moved in 15-20 years ago when it was already collapsing
But many of these homes are cheaper to buy so enabling those who retire on small pensions to have their own home, possibly for the first time and expected to live out their retirement and have clearly improved their homes. As one resident said, when they moved they were told it was eroding at 1m a year. But, because climate change has acelerated significantly over the last 5 years , they are now losing huge chunks of coastline at a time. Every system has its tipping point. It is only a matter of time before this is happening at many other places around UK and that is before we mention homes lost to flood waters or built on flood plains. The government has not recognised the impact of this long term and has not put a plan in place expecting 'the market' to solve the problem but what profit is there to be made for the market by protecting a few homes-none. There is no strategic thinking in UK. Britain's climate refugees.
Doesn't sea defences in one place shift the focus of erosion downshore?
Would have been good to have some more context about the pros and cons of different options.
Amazing video. I’ve been to this coastline and this is the best and most accurate documentation of the resilience of these desperate communities. It really sums up the problem. I like that you got a scope of arguments as well
I remember reading in a local newspaper back when Great Yarmouth “Outer harbour” was constructed.
& there was mention of the environmental effects on currents and the sandbanks out there.
Makes you wonder if there has been an noticeable increase in erosion SINCE that was constructed. As Hemsby is only a few miles north along the coast! 🤔
Great series BTW. I very much enjoyed this video! 👏
I've just started watching but wanted to thank you for making this video. I grew up with annual holidays to Hemsby at the Seacroft holiday camp. I've not been there since my friend who lived there passed away several years ago, and it is heartbreaking to see what has happened.
Thank you Faultline for another fantastic, engaging, and exciting video. Really rate you guys and can't wait to see how far you'll go. Yes, Mack !!!
Thank you so much for your video on this. I have so many fond memories of Hemsby, it sickens me that the government aren't doing anything, it's an absolute disgrace.
That's a really great documentary. Many countries around the world are experiencing similiar problems. My wife is from Jakarta, Indonesia. The future of her city is uncertain, because of the sinking city and rising water levels. The Dutch are also involved there to try to save the Indonesian capital.
It's a shame the British government is not acting quicker and trying to find long term solutions for that coastline, and especially for the residents of Hemsby which are running out of time.
Sadly, there is a finite amount of cash available nationally and our current government is too busy dishing out small fortunes to Rwanda in its insane policy of discouraging a few small boats carrying illegal migrants from crossing the channel instead of selecting the most urgent problems!
@@royfearn4345 even so...
how can justify spending over 40 miljon, to protect only some 3000 residents , for maybe 10 years top? before you would need to respend such an amount?
it's a natural process of decline on one end, and land growth an the other.. indeed seriously fastened by climate change.. witch mean, it's only gone speed up, and gonne need WAY bigger, way more expensive defenses withing 10 , 20 and 30 years time...
it's actually cheaper to move the whole town some km inwards that would give them at least 20 -30 years, that there new wooden homes would last..
building a dike in such a place makes no sense..
even the dutch have understood that now that can't hold up against the water everywhere, you have to choose places to let the water reclaim land too ..
Great work Andy! Your videos have been getting better and better over time.
Was surprised to see this having only less than 10k views rn then I noticed it was reuploaded.
such a well made video. loving this content
So well made! Great job!
Thanks a lot! 🙏
wow this is such a good video. I could watch it every day
Great video. Here for the 2nd time appreciate the efforts, Faultline.
What an excellent documentary highlighting what this community is going facing! Thank you Faultline
Having grown up in Norfolk, this makes me so sad to see. We used to holiday here every summer during the 2000s as a kid. I stayed at Pontins and other holiday areas around Hemsby. It would be so sad to see it disappear.
Would you be happy if they put up loads of sea defenses and lost the beach as if you are THAT is what you need to tell politicians
I was told at school in 1986, that the area i live in would be 15ft underwater by the year 2000, here i am almost 40 years later, living 500 metres from the English Channel, and the sea still hasn't risen by the speculated 30 feet they predicted by computer simulation.
However, higher temperatures, shrinking glaciers, more intense storms, rising seas, etc. have become as they were predicted. Also, I would love to see that prediction about 15 feet underwater. You see, climate change deniers are notorious for lying and/or using hyperbole.
Excellent production quality, research, and presentation.👍
Great video Faultline. I gave it another watch!!
This land erosion has been happening for 60 years to my knowledge,when I was in the area as a teenager. Successive governments are well aware of he serious problem it is and have done next to nothing to stop it from destroying people's homes and lives.
It's been going on for centuries, Dunwich lost tracts of lands more or less overnight in the 1600's I think it was, when 9 parishes were lost, and a sand storm dropped tonnes of sand inland, theres loads of references on various history groups about how sand had ruined farmland, there's a time team program about it, it's the nature of that coast line all the way up to parts of the North East, holderness etc, at one time it was all connected to Europe via doggerland. Which was flooded out with rising sea levels after the last ice age ended, it's all mostly sand, and the jurassic parts of chalky lands from Dover & the seven sisters up to Hunstanton. Its such a "delicate" coastline so prone to the sea, government could spend trillions and not stop it I feel. Its very sad as its a lovely coastline.
Chalk downland from Kent through Sussex and into Hampshire was once millions of years ago was under the sea.
I live in WA state where we have several coastal communities suffering a similar fate. Much like Hemsby, one of my family's favorite places to visit on weekend trips, cabins located at Kalaloch, WA may need to be demolished soon because of eroding, encroaching coastline. There's even a famous landmark located nearby (the "tree of life" which is a tree seemingly defying gravity and supporting itself even as ground eroded beneath it... I've seen pics of it all over the internet). Sadly as climate change accelerates I think many of these communities may ultimately need to be relocated further inland. Great video as always.
I also live in WA (Western Australia) and the same is happening to many coastal towns here,
Sad to see
Amerikanen zijn ook niet slim genoeg om dijken te bouwen, of om dit te kunnen lezen
Just for some context: Kalaloch is in Washington state in the USA. It’s within Olympic National Park, an area of the world that some became familiar with thanks to the popularity of the Twilight series. Indeed, Kalaloch uses the same ZIP Code as Forks (the town in which Twilight was set), meaning mailing addresses there have Forks addresses.
thank you for this video. It is very well crafted and you brought out the human impact by your sensitive interviewing of those affected,
As the last ice age left the uk approx 10,000 years ago the land beneath already buckled by igneous activity began to tilt causing the South East area to rise exposing sedimentary deposits. Unfortunately sections of this were built on but with much of it falling back into the sea, many square miles of land have been reclaimed. What makes this worse is that this region is sinking year on year as the tilting action reverses due to homeostasis.
Yeah coastal erosion is a bugger, storms have always been. I live there. Soft clay beds are easily eroded. This isn't new, been going on for centuries. Pull up a map of Norfolk in Roman times....Great Yarmouth was under the sea.
you covered a lot in just 22 mins. great work!
Great video Andy - shame that it got struck down by UA-cam the first time around.
The sand is a big hint.
Sort of means it was under the sea once and looks like it will be again unless something drastic is done soon.
That's pretty irrelevant. There are sand dunes from the sea floor in midstate new york, but there's no scenario where the sea will recaim them for millennia.
Not comparing like with like
There are a few movies though where NY is under water
I understand this at a personal level but one has to consider whether it's really worth it to spend tens of millions to foritify a coastline that has eroded for hundreds of years.
Thank you for re-uploading, very interesting 👍✌️
No problem 👍
We were there in 1976 during the heatwave, you could not move in the swimming pool it was standing room only because everyone was in the pool trying to keep cool that summer, there was a lot more to the town back then than there is today, considering Hemsby brings in so much money every summer, you would of thought they would use that to help this town. It’s like they love the money coming in, but to hell with the town take what we can while we still can. With the amount of money that pours in each summer they could have built half a dozen erosion barriers in the past 30-40 years.
Hemsby is stuck in the early 80's. Its only been the last 3 or 4 years that shops there introduced card payment machines and still the shops have the same old tat year in year out
This is a good documentary. I don't mind watching it again.
We cannot save everywhere, but we can do much more to look after those affected.
As government is deciding it's not worth supporting these regions, it should instigate strict planning restrictions preventing further development and a national insurance scheme to indemnify (at a reasonable premium) those whose homes are at risk.
Basically, it's crash or soft landing and the government is choosing crash.
How hard can it be to lay a few boulders
@@michaelthompson679 Been tried, just down the coast at Caister there was a full sea wall. All destroyed by the sea.
@@michaelthompson679 The boulders are a temporary solution. They might give protection from the regular waves, but not from storms, that have higher waves than the boulders go up. Also the boulders will sink down into the beach, so they need to be rebuilt from time to time (maybe every decade, maybe more frequently).
Another problem is that if you stop erosion at one point, it will go faster next to it. In a century or so Hemsby will become an island, making it even more costly to protect. The solution would be to protect the entire coastline of England, but that is just not feasible (there is not enough boulders to eventually dump into the sea).
Well done you've earned a sub 🎉 lovely piece
truly underrated work man!
Great film and very informative. Sad to see so many homes under threat. However, there was no real discussion on a solution. Rocks at the base of the 'cliff' may save homes above, but not the beach. Is there a solution? Be good to hear what the ideal solution / flood defence is. I am not sure how you beat the sea? The cost line is convex in shape so a Dutch style barrier would not work that I can see? Be good to hear if any experts in teh field reading this have some proposals. Nonetheless, as the saying goes, 'An Englishmans home is his castle' - that castle may be made of bricks and mortar, it may be a narrow boat on a canal, or a wooden built chalet, but they are ALL homes and should be treated equally. I do not think there is a solution to save the beach, but authorities should treat all homes equally. I feel so sorry for those affected.
Super video! I'd've been interested to hear a touch more on the geography of sediment cells in this context. I've only a (half-remembered) A-level understanding, but adding in lots of hard sea defences can worsen beach erosion, only protecting the dune edge. That suggests, from my layman perspective, that Hemsby will still lose its beach and much of its tourism despite expensive hard defences like a sea wall in place.
Maybe softer defences or more indirect methods would be a more sustainable solution? Like encouraging sand dune succession with hardier vegetation, the construction of an artificial reef or sandbank to reduce wave energy further from shore and promote sediment deposition, or maybe adding groynes to catch sediment removal (if longshore drift is an issue here). Just a thought if you ever do a follow-up video or something similar. Although another difficult aspect is that these home-owners need help now, not after various studies have been completed & published.
It is truly shocking to me that timber-framed houses don't qualify as permanent homes under government regulation, especially as we try to find more sustainable building materials than concrete. These people need help, & at the very least they need to have a stable insurance and relocation program available to them. I wish the government wasn't being so wobbly on their climate policies.
Some very good points. As for the houses, I believe most of them are leasehold properties so it would be for the landowner to deal with that, but sadly the video doesn't touch on that as much as I would have liked it to. And also to note that there are some of these homes for sale on Rightmove for £100k!
Great vid, sorry to hear about reupload
good documentary.
feels like a properly put together production
Before climate change was invented, we were told that the British Isles are tilting along a North/South line. In Wales is a castle with steps leading down to a field which used to lead down to to sea. The sea is now half a mile away, and was considered proof of the tilt, lifting in the West and sinking is the East.
Spot on 👌
True but it is the speed of change that is the problem.
Harlech.
It took a thousand years
@@DM-vq8uxSo? The castle that is now 2 miles away from the sea, was built in 1283. That's not a thousand years
This channel is absolutely awesome. Amazing quality and you guys are super charismatic
🙏🫣😅
Very good video, well researched.
Someone pointed out before that Tom Scott did a similar video two years ago about Covehithe which is about 30 miles south of Hemsby and similarly doomed. I like yours better because you took the time to talk to the locals.
Tom didn’t need any input from the locals as Tom is the mayor of Covehithe
He is also the mayor of Hemsby
Dunwich was devastated by coastal erosion in the middle ages. What did the Tories do? Nothing!
Thank you for showing this.
I first holidayed at Hemsby as a kid around 45 years ago and remember playing on that WWII concrete pillbox. It was actually in among the sand dunes back then. It used to be a loooonnnngg walk from where the lifeboat station is through the dunes and across what was a vast beach before you could dip your toes in the sea. Now it is almost lapping at the door.
The extremely poor geology means that errosion protection is impossible it's that simple. Even the Dutch needed bedrock to build defences on when they exist you can pump sand as a filler so quoting Dutch technology is a bit off here. Sand you can only plant dune grass which here is not done because the dunes are full of private housing.
And the sad truth is the area was full of millionaire homes or near a royal home more would have been done to protect the Coastline. Unfortunately, our government and planners need to be more aware of what naturally happens in areas and stop allowing buildings in areas that have flooding or the land falling away. Maybe it's about time the government moves the town or maybe put a rock wall barrier along the beach and make a larger beach to protect the land.
I don't always agree with you guys but I'm more than happy to watch again this video because quality is always great
Brilliant documentary well done to all involved
So the town is built on a 100 foot thick sand dune. Should tell you something.
Annual sea level rise is around its average over 10,000 year.
Storms are weather, not some fictitious climate change.
Government should have spent money as the Dutch did on proper sea defences.
Sad people are losing their homes.
Maybe I’m a dum-dum, but there seems to be no economic incentive to save this town. Fact 1: The beach is what feeds the local economy. Fact 2: Those huge boulders that are being put in place to protect the houses from further erosion eliminate the possibility of beaches being there. These two facts cancel each other out economically. So even if the local authorities start to be proactive and help the residents, Hemsby won’t become a tourist destination again.
So sorry to see it had to be reuploaded. I gonna watch it again
Great documentary!
this shore is a good video
You can't fight erosion and rising sea levels, especially when it's multifactorial. The only solution is to relocate the community miles inland.
Great documentary mate. I kitesurf along the east coast from cleethorpes to Norfolk. Heartbreaking to see the coastline disappearing.
Outstanding Documentary young man. 👏🏿👏🏿 I wish you success in your career. New sub!
Thanks and welcome
Up here in Angus., £16.4 million pounds was spent on river flood defences in Brechin. That scheme protected 150 properties from the installation year in 2015. It lasted 8 years before failing in 2023 with Storm Babet. A £100000 scheme per property and not fit for purpose. It goes to show why some communities crying out for defences aren’t going to get them: The prospective property to be protected isn’t worth the protection and the efficacy of the proposed protection isn’t known against future storms. The sad fact is that climate change is going to completely change much of our land and society.
And people just don’t get it
@@opaqueentityNo, you don’t do you?
@@karensims9817 nope I do. It’s not worth the cost in some places. But feel free to do a gofundme to get the money required if you think there’s enough interest.
I think the interesting bit about Hemsby is that it’s all about people living in what are basically chalets and the area behind them? Holiday parks. It’s not the same as other places where there’s real housing
Sorry , not being horrible, and yes it’s sad, but it’s a bloody reality, it’s a shore line, what do you expect !!
Fantastic little documentary. Watched it the first time around. Just here to do my bit :)
Excellent content.
Weidest déjà vu feeling ever
Engagement
🤣
The problem we had with multiple properties at Birling Gap that the cliffs were eroding . English Nature would not allow Granite however because other nearby towns now have alot of extra shingle and granite to protect it, this made Birling Gap erode quicker as the sea levels are higher their all because the sea is pushed up towards the cliff. Sadly lots of houses and a hotel is heading over the cliff...Beachy Head is now disappearing too.😢 So sad for anyone in this situation 😞
Amazing report, amazing video
Theres a story in the bible about a man who builds his house on sand. I probably learned it aged 5. It’s kinda common sense really if a 5 yr old kid knows not to do it….🤷🏾♂️
I live about 10 minutes away from Hemsby. Its been totally abandoned by anyone who could do anything to save it, its insane. The local MP Brandon Lewis just does not care - he was even the secretary of state for Northern Ireland for 2 years. Northern Ireland! No wonder he didnt care when his more "important" job was as far away from his actual constituents as humanly possible. By now its pretty obvious hes fully in the Westminster bubble, only really pretends to care about us when its time for winning votes again. The local council has just shrugged its shoulders and decided saving Hemsby would be too expensive without even bothering to consider its valuable position for tourism makes it worth spending the money to save it. Its a genuine shame what has been done to Hemsby, its an absolutely lovely place, and is just actively being allowed to die
Maybe things would get done if Parliament was rebuilt in, say, Hemsby? They can fund the Thames Barrier, maybe if politicians lived and worked on the edge they'd have a more positive approach to real people's problems?
How valuable is Hemsby? Seriously? That bloke mentions £100 million. From what?
A great documentary on Hemsby. I've never been to it on the east coast, but I didn't know it was that bad.
Great video, great story and great job.
Glad you enjoyed it dude!
This is not 'Climate Change' it is simply the climate which has been changing for 100s of years. It showed, on the map, villages disappearing from the 15th century onwanrds BEFORE the start of the industrial revelution which gets the blame for EVERYTHING.
Much of where these people live will be reclaimed land since the Dutch came over and what they could reclaim, they had as farming, again, before the industrial revolution. However, unlike the Dutch, the maintenance on keeping the land has not continued so the sea is doing what it is good at, reclaiming the land.
Both my husband and myself remember that in Geography at school, you have a natural process. When one place loses land, another gains. Landmasses constantly change due to the sea and, as the man said, EVEN now, the land in the north of England, is still rising after the ice age and creates a tipping effect lower down. Nature continues to do its thing in spite of us self important little humans.
We are not trying to save the planet, we're trying to save our own skins. The planet will continue without us as it really doesn't care at all.
I agree that we are making life very difficult for other species besides our self important selves, but Earth will continue and it will find its own balance not matter what we do.
Shock, horror, the local MP gave a good political answer where he said nothing, but said it very well. Also, councils everywhere are professional wriggle merchants in not coming up with funds for anything as they want to keep it for themselves. They give great lip service but in the end they really couldn't care less.
The East & South East Coast of England has been slowly sinking for thousands of years & will continue to do so, nothing to do with climate change, tis just geological land shifts.