The devastation of Hurricane Sandy in 2012 isn’t a distant memory. According to a Rutgers University report, sea level there has risen 18 inches over the past century - more than double the global average. By all scientific accounts, the Jersey Shore has already been highly affected by climate change and sea-level rise. If you haven’t been tuned into the minutiae of Shore politics, this scene could seem a little confounding. Many protesters wore white t-shirts reading STOP THE WINDFARMS - a message from Protect Our Coast, a small nonprofit that cropped up in the past year and a half to oppose the construction of giant offshore wind turbines, which, the protesters claimed, would destroy the Jersey Shore, both for the humans who enjoy going to the beach there and for the wildlife living in the ocean. He was a local real estate agent named Rich Baehrle, and he was shouting about a matter of great importance: “Stop the windmills!”īaehrle was among the more dedicated protesters on the beach, but there were hundreds in all, stretching from a wooden pier to a rusted drainpipe. Technically speaking, the creature wasn’t a whale it was a human dressed as one, wearing a full body costume. At the shoreline, people stood together in a row, watching the creature before them. It was a warm summer day in July, and the beach was packed as tight as a mosh pit. Black and white, of average height and stocky build its mouth was agape, revealing a set of pointy white teeth. There was a whale on the beach of Ocean City. Anti-wind-power signs at the Ocean City beach in July / Photograph by Rachel Wisniewski/The Washington Post/Getty Images
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