Dulac, LA Coastal Erosion Rate
Shoreline change 22.1 miles south of Dulac, LA
5.08 feet a year: that is the measured retreat rate USGS's transects show for the coast 22.1 miles south of Dulac, LA, averaged across the full historical record surveyed here. At that rate, the shoreline has lost roughly 50.8 feet over the last decade.
What this reading actually covers
Nothing here is parcel-level. USGS's raw transects run every few hundred feet along the shore; this page averages the ones nearest Dulac, LA into one ~3.5-mile reading rather than picking a single arbitrary line to represent the area. Centered near 29.08°N, 90.66°W. The survey behind it runs to 2001, in USGS's Gulf of Mexico assessment, using the LRR method. Shoreline surveys aren't repeated every year, so this is the most recent long-term measurement USGS has published for this coast, not a live reading.
25 years at this rate
If 5.08 ft/yr holds for the next 25 years, the coast 22.1 miles south of Dulac, LA would retreat roughly 127 more feet, a projection, not a certainty: erosion rates shift with storms, sediment supply and any armoring built in the meantime.
How solid is this number
41 transects feed this segment's number; 100% of them individually measured retreat. The published margin on this reading runs ±2.99 ft/yr. This segment ranks 53 of 1211 measured US coastal segments, ordered from fastest erosion to fastest growth. Source: USGS Open-File Report 2004-1089. South Padre Island, TX sits at national rank 90 for erosion (3.22 ft/yr), one reference point among the 1211 scored segments, 445 miles from here. 1.1 miles away, Dulac, LA is the nearest other measured stretch: severe erosion at 7.19 ft/yr.
One address near Dulac: the Coastal Change Hazards Portal zooms past this stretch to the underlying map.