D.C.’s Soggy Forecast: NBC Makes Same Hysterical Prediction As 30 Years Ago

On Tuesday’s NBC Today, NBC weatherman Al Roker warned viewers that climate change was “threatening some iconic American landmarks” and even touted predictions that Washington D.C. may soon be underwater as a result.

The only problem with that dire forecast? NBC has been making that same wild claim for the past 30 years.

“In fact, experts say climate change, it’s already here and it’s causing our sea levels to rise. That is threatening some iconic American landmarks,” Roker announced at the top of his report, the latest installment for the network’s Climate in Crisis series.

Moments later, William Sweet of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration sounded the alarm:

“The sea-level rise flooding of the coast has already begun…One foot of sea-level rise by 2050, we’re really talking about big problems at that point.”

Roker feared: “And the impact of those rising sea levels are already being felt up and down the east coast, from Boston, New York City, to Norfolk and Miami.”

After hyping how “The tide is also creeping towards the launch pads in Cape Canaveral, Florida,” he added: “At the rate, we’re going, climate researchers predict a future where major cities, including our nation’s capital, could look like this.”

An animation produced by the environmental activist group Climate Central appeared on screen, showing D.C.’s National Mall covered in water.

In addition, Roker fretted over the Statue of Liberty being submerged and declared that the remains of America’s first colony in Jamestown, Virginia “is at risk of being washed away.”

Following the taped segment, Roker hyped that “the window is fast closing” to take action on climate change. Co-host Hoda Kotb chimed in:

“Well when you see that artist rendition of what goes on in D.C., what that would look like, it really kind of hits you hard to see those monuments under[water].”

As it turns out, that “window” has allegedly been “fast closing” for three decades. On May 4, 1989, Today show, environmentalist Dr. Paul Ehrlich reported for the NBC broadcast and breathlessly predicted:

“…we could expect to lose all of Florida, Washington D.C., and the Los Angeles basin…we’ll be in rising waters with no ark in sight.”

The following year, on January 11, 1990, Ehrlich doubled down on his hysterical assertions, delivering this epic rant:

There is an even greater threat that scientists can only speculate about. As global temperatures rise, they may cause the massive West Antarctic ice sheet to slip more rapidly. Then we’ll be facing a sea-level rise not of one to three feet in a century, but of 10 or 20 feet in a much shorter time.

The Supreme Court would be flooded. You could tie your boat to the Washington Monument. Storm surges would make the Capitol unusable. For Today, Paul Ehrlich in Washington, DC, on the future shoreline of Chesapeake Bay.

NBC, along with the rest of the liberal media, have engaged in similar fearmongering for years, with reporters also seeing New York City doomed to being “lost to the sea.”

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