Nicole Hancock
Indigenous community hosts full moon ceremony ...

Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.

Indigenous community hosts full moon ceremony to heal Chedoke Creek

coastal communities

Unchecked climate change puts Canada’s West Coast in hot water

Unchecked climate change puts Canada’s West Coast in hot water

Last year was the hottest on record for the ocean, an upward trend only expected to continue as it wreaks havoc on coastal communities and spurs irreversible losses to marine ecosystems. Ocean warming has cascading effects, melting polar ice and causing sea-level rise, marine heat waves and ocean acidification, the United Nations’ panel of climate experts made clear on Monday. Sea-level rise has doubled in the last three decades, reaching a record high in 2021, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported. Rising seas, coupled with more extreme weather, are setting the stage for a perfect storm of flooding for coastal communities. 

IMPAC5

IMPAC5

Or consider how climate change is also melting ice and glaciers in the Arctic. For Inuit, this means that the traditional way of life is being disrupted and destroyed. That same ice melt is also raising water levels, endangering coastal communities and island nations. Tuvalu, for example, is building a digital version of its country to preserve its history, culture and language. If things continue on this course, there is a good chance the nation will be submerged by the end of the century.

Coastal communities in Quebec's Gaspé Peninsula fight ravaging seas, climate change by retreating Social Sharing

Coastal communities in Quebec's Gaspé Peninsula fight ravaging seas, climate change by retreating Social Sharing

Against the ravaging seas, Quebec's coastal communities have learned through bitter experience that the way to advance against climate change is to retreat. Over the past decade, civilization has been pulled back from the water's edge where possible along the eastern stretch of the Gaspé Peninsula where coastline is particularly vulnerable to erosion. Defences erected against the sea ages ago have been dismantled, rock by rock, concrete chunk by chunk.

B.C. coastal communities assess damage, look to future after king tides, extreme weather wreak havoc

B.C. coastal communities assess damage, look to future after king tides, extreme weather wreak havoc

A day after high tides and extreme weather battered parts of B.C.'s South Coast, many communities are assessing the damage. Flooding and dangerous conditions along waterfronts around the South Coast resulted in closures, warnings and damage to infrastructure like seawalls and piers. On Friday, the town of Qualicum Beach on the east coast of Vancouver Island said its seawall had been partially damaged, and asked the public to avoid the area.

How undersea aquifers could become a source of fresh water for coastal communities

How undersea aquifers could become a source of fresh water for coastal communities

Groundwater under the sea floor off the coast of Prince Edward Island could solve a host of problems for the Island, but there are a lot of questions that need to be answered first. The research vessel Maria S. Merian is currently off the North Shore of P.E.I., using various techniques to search for groundwater below the bottom of the Gulf of St. Lawrence. "P.E.I. is 100 per cent reliant on groundwater and it's a finite resource, and we are very cautious with how we use it, as we should be," said Josh MacFadyen, the Canada Research Chair in Geospatial Humanities at the University of Prince Edward Island.

Lead levels in Prince Rupert drinking water could point to B.C.-wide problems

Lead levels in Prince Rupert drinking water could point to B.C.-wide problems

Leona Peterson doesn’t drink the water from her tap anymore. The single mother says she was warned about lead in the water by a neighbour as soon as she moved into the subsidized Indigenous housing complex where she lives in Prince Rupert, a city of almost 12,000 people in northwestern B.C. “She said, ‘There is lead in our water,’” Peterson said. “‘Don’t doubt it, just start flushing.’”

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