Newly Discovered 90,000-Year-Old Human Footprints Reveal How Much Higher Sea Levels Used To Be

Human footprints embedded into rock that used to be a sand beach at the limit of the seashore’s “swash flow” and high tide lie 20 to 30 meters above the present sea level. The footprints are dated to ~90,000 years ago.

It is estimated that sea levels were globally about 6 to 9 meters higher than today during the last interglacial (~130,000 to 115,000 years ago), when CO2 supposedly peaked at 275 ppm (Sommers et al., 2022).

Image Source: Sommers et al., 2022

Evidence along the coasts of North Africa (Morocco) suggests sea levels were “20 m above the present level” about 95,000 years ago (MIS 5c).

This is consistent with a new study that reports human footprints embedded and preserved in a rocky beach “20 to 30 m above sea level” can be dated to 90.3 ±7.6 thousand years ago.

The water limit, or shoreline, very likely reached this elevation at that time, as the requisite conditions for “salt-crusting,” the preservation of footprints, involve a location at “the landward limits of the spring high tidal zone” and at the “limits of swash flow”.

 

Image Source: Sedrati et al., 2024

Interestingly, this same Moroccan region’s shoreline has, in recent decades, been stable to advancing seaward at a rate of +0.89 m per year (Amara Zenati et al., 2024). This is inconsistent with the viewpoint that sea level rise is poised to flood the Earth’s coasts and shrink her shorelines.

Image Source: Amara Zenati et al., 2024

And coastal expansion isn’t just a local phenomenon. Globally, shorelines have been advancing seaward at a rate of +0.26 m per year since the 1980s, as, despite sea level rise, the “global coastline is prograding” (Mao et al., 2021).

Image Source: Mao et al., 2021

12 responses to “Newly Discovered 90,000-Year-Old Human Footprints Reveal How Much Higher Sea Levels Used To Be”

  1. soundos

    very good content

  2. Newly Discovered 90,000-Year-Old Human Footprints Reveal Sea Levels Were Much Higher – altnews.org

    […] Read more at No Tricks Zone […]

  3. Robert Folkerts

    Of course, the assumptions play a role. Has the land topography remained static? Considering the whole earth, apart from originally being water, has been completely inundated with water, so clearly sea levels have been higher in the past. There is ample evidence of all of this.

  4. Newly Discovered 90,000-Year-Old Human Footprints Reveal How Much Higher Sea Levels Used To Be – Watts Up With That?

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  5. Heinz

    “Winter heat”

    While early summer is knocking at our door, winter has just begun in Antarctica in the southern hemisphere. Almost minus 80 degrees were measured at the Vostok research station on April 29. Such extreme cold is rarely reached this early in the year.

    At minus 89.2 degrees, the station holds the coldest record on earth, measured on July 21, 1983. Values below minus 80 degrees in April are also extremely rare at the Earth’s cold pole and have only been recorded three times in the last 60 years.

    https://www.wetteronline.de/wetterticker/frueh-extreme-winterkaelte-fast-minus-80-grad-in-der-antarktis–3725f9fc-61f4-41e0-bc00-32ca08462e90

  6. -80°C: Antarctic Vostok Station Records “Extreme Winter Cold”…Not Even Winter Yet!

    […] Hat-tip: Heinz […]

  7. Antarctic Vostok Station Records “Extreme Winter Cold”…Not Even Winter Yet! – Watts Up With That? – The Insight Post

    […] Hat-tip: Heinz […]

  8.  -80°C: Antarctic Vostok Station Records “Extreme Winter Cold”…Not Even Winter Yet! - Climate- Science.press

    […] Hat-tip: Heinz […]

  9. Kürzlich entdeckte 90.000 Jahre alte menschliche Fußabdrücke zeigen, wie viel höher der Meeresspiegel früher lag | EIKE - Europäisches Institut für Klima & Energie
  10. -80°C: LA STAZIONE ANTARTICA DI VOSTOK REGISTRA UN "FREDDO INVERNALE ESTREMO" MA L'INVERNO È ANCORA LONTANO!

    […] Tanto di cappello: Heinz […]

  11. -80°C: LA STAZIONE ANTARTICA DI VOSTOK REGISTRA UN “FREDDO INVERNALE ESTREMO” MA L’INVERNO È ANCORA LONTANO! – ItaNews24

    […] Tanto di cappello: Heinz […]

  12. Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #598 – Watts Up With That?

    […] Newly Discovered 90,000-Year-Old Human Footprints Reveal How Much Higher Sea Levels Used To Be […]

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