BY SAMMY FRETWELL, ALI RAJ, AND SOFIA MOUTINHO OCTOBER 20, 2020 06:00 AM
In North and South Carolina, sea-level rise is most noticeable in counties along the coast, where beaches shrink, dunes disappear and homes crumble, but the effects of climate change reach well inland. “Beyond the Beach” is a seven-part series examining the health toll that climate change is already taking on the people who live and work in the Carolinas.
The project is a partnership of The News & Observer in Raleigh, North Carolina, The State in Columbia, South Carolina, Columbia Journalism School and the Center for Public Integrity. Funding support for “Beyond the Beach” came from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting. Columbia Journalism Investigations, an investigative reporting unit at the Columbia Journalism School, also contributed to the project. Funding for CJI comes from the school’s Investigative Reporting Resource and the Energy Foundation. Read the entire series HERE.
What is vibrio? Deadly flesh-eating bacteria migrates to odd place in Carolina waters
A microbe so dangerous it can strip the flesh from a person’s arms and legs showed up in the Waccamaw River eight years ago, in some places more than 20 miles away from the ocean and the brackish marshes where it thrives.
It was a chilling discovery for scientists at the University of South Carolina. After six months of sampling river water, it became clear that the nasty germ, known as vibrio, had worked its way into a place not known to harbor the bacteria.
“I originally thought we would not hardly find anything,’’ said USC researcher Geoff Scott, one of the scientists involved with the study. “Those numbers are low but the bottom line is it is moving that far up and we are seeing measurable concentrations.’’ Read this article HERE.