Now you see them but in 20 years, you probably won't thanks to rising sea levels that could cause some islands to disappear completely.
Melting ice in the Arctic is certainly a factor but so are warming oceans. A warmer ocean means a larger ocean thanks to warm water's ability to expand to levels that could envelop whole islands. In June, the National Academy Of Sciences released a study suggesting for every degree of global temperature increase, sea levels would rise by 2.1 meters.
That might not seem like much for anyone living on the mainland in North America but climatologists are also expecting rising sea levels to produce stronger storm surges. For those living near the coast, extreme weather events like Superstorm Sandy that left landmarks like Liberty Island and Ellis Island almost completely submerged could be more frequent.
And for residents of the island nations mentioned in the video above, it could very well mean their demise.
