Rising sea level threatens 130 islanders on Île de Sein
By MAÏA de la BAUME
23 July 2012 ÎLE DE SEIN, France – The 130 inhabitants of this tiny island off the coast of Brittany are survivors. They and their ancestors, who trace their origins to the Celtic druids, have lived through frequent periods of hunger, a terrible flood and two cholera epidemics. During World War II, many of the islanders refused to accept German occupation and fled by boat to join Charles de Gaulle’s Free French Army. Today, the residents of Île de Sein are confronted by a more existential threat. With increasingly rough storms and a global rise in sea levels of 0.14 inches per year since the early 1990s, the existence of the island — just five feet above sea level, on average — seems increasingly at risk. “There is a growing probability that the island may be hit by a bigger than usual storm,” said Denis Bredin, who is part of the government office that is charged with protecting seacoasts in Brittany and based in the nearby port city of Brest. “We know that it will happen, but we can’t say when.” The Île de Sein is a treeless, question-mark-shaped island of 138 acres, regularly swept by heavy winds. It gets more than 2,000 vacationers in August, but has no police officers or cars or bank. In the 17th century, King Louis XIV rewarded the islanders for having rescued several crew members from a sinking ship by exempting them from paying property taxes, a privilege they still hold. In this westernmost part of France, the sea has already swamped the island twice, in 1924 and again in 2008, when a deadly storm called Emma lashed the island with waves as high as 26 feet that damaged sea walls and flooded homes. The water even invaded the small granite chapel of St.-Corentin, built in the 1970s, on one of the highest spots of the island. “This had never happened before,” said Serge Coatmeur, who runs a lighthouse here, one of the last still operating in Brittany. “It is like living on a volcano that can burst at any time,” said Michel Touzet, a retired pilot who settled on the Île de Sein 20 years ago. “In winter, we never know whether we’ll find ourselves sitting on the roof of the church or not.” Rising sea levels have threatened the existence of small island states, including Kiribati, the Marshall Islands, the Maldives and Tuvalu. In fact, the government of Tuvalu announced recently that Tuvaluans would need to leave for good within 50 years. But the residents here prefer not to talk about evacuation or displacement. They are particularly attached to what some called their “fragment of land.” […]
