Chesapeake Bay is presented as part of the advancing threat to Washington: crab swarms appear in the bay and along the Potomac River, with sightings reported closer to the capital. The reports turn the bay from a geographic setting into an early warning of the crisis’s approach to the seat of government.

The Threat Approaches Washington

Officials report that crab swarms have appeared in Chesapeake Bay and along the Potomac River, seemingly moving up the estuary. Additional sightings near Alexandria and south of Arlington are initially awaiting confirmation. The pattern links the bay to a wider advance toward Washington, though the reports distinguish the sightings in the bay and river from those nearer the city.

Confirmation and Emergency Response

Surveillance drones confirm crab sightings around Washington, prompting Judith Li to say the city will have to be quarantined. She describes the confirmed threat alongside the isolation of New York and orders troops with flamethrowers to surround key coastal cities while an antitoxin is developed. Chesapeake Bay is not itself identified as a quarantine zone; its narrative importance lies in the evidence that the crisis has reached waterways leading toward the capital.

A Coastal Corridor Becomes a Warning

The crab reports shape the government’s sense of Washington’s vulnerability. The White House chief of staff fears the city may become another New York, and the President heads to Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska after resisting departure. By placing the swarm in Chesapeake Bay and the Potomac estuary, the novel makes the approach of the marine emergency legible through its geography: the threat is no longer distant or confined to the open sea, but is reported along the waterways toward the political center.