North Eastham, MA Coastal Erosion Rate
Is the coast eroding 4.2 miles northeast of North Eastham, MA?
The coast 4.2 miles northeast of North Eastham, MA has been retreating at a measured 0.98 feet a year, USGS's own long-term rate for this stretch, built from historical shoreline positions rather than a single survey. At that rate, the shoreline has lost roughly 9.8 feet over the last decade.
What "North Eastham" means on this page
This is a roughly 3.5-mile stretch of coast, not one address or parcel - USGS's own transects run every few hundred feet, but that's finer than any one property needs, so this page reports the stretch nearest North Eastham, MA. Centered near 41.89°N, 69.97°W. The survey behind it runs to 2007-2009, in USGS's New England / Mid-Atlantic 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 0.98 ft/yr holds for the next 25 years, the coast 4.2 miles northeast of North Eastham, MA would retreat roughly 25 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
63 transects feed this segment's number; 100% of them individually measured retreat. Uncertainty on this specific number: 0.17 ft/yr either side. This segment ranks 197 of 1211 measured US coastal segments, ordered from fastest erosion to fastest growth. Source: USGS Open-File Report 2010-1119. For scale: Grand Isle, LA, 1440 miles away, ranks 6 of 1211 nationally for erosion, 19.03 ft/yr, many times over this stretch's own rate. 1.8 miles up the coast, North Eastham, MA shows 0.83 ft/yr of eroding.
One address near North Eastham: the Coastal Change Hazards Portal zooms past this stretch to the underlying map.