By TIM PEARCE
Al Gore was challenged on climate science Tuesday night when the mayor of Tangier Island, a community threatened by coastal erosion, told the environmentalist film producer he hadn’t seen the sea level change since he began his first career as a commercial crabber in 1970.
Gore was taking questions from the audience on a CNN town hall with Anderson Cooper when the fisherman and Tangier Island mayor James Eskridge refuted Gore’s assertion that rising sea levels were endangering coastal communities.
“I’m a commercial crabber and I’ve been working the Chesapeake Bay for 50+ years. I have a crab house business out on the water and the water level is the same as it was when the place was built in 1970,” Eskridge said. “I’m not a scientist, but I am a keen observer and if sea level rises are occurring, why am I not seeing signs of it?”