Do you remember what you were doing 190,000 years ago? I don’t either, but according to National Geographic, modern humans had been roaming Earth for about 10,000 years by then, even though we were still in the prime peak of the Stone Age.
The reason that number is significant now is that it appears New York City is literally sinking underneath its own weight. In fact, it slides further into Earth’s crust at an average of 1-2 millimeters a year. Since the Empire State Building is roughly 380,000 millimeters tall, even a caveman from 190,000 years ago might be able to run the numbers and realize time is running out, albeit slowly, for New Yorkers.
A research article published by Advancing Earth and Space Science laid out the rather gloomy details, and if you are looking to blame someone or something, it falls on the size of the skyscrapers that dot the skyline of NYC. Because they are so tall and densely clustered, their collective weight of 1.7 trillion tons applies too much pressure to the ground, and they are slowly sinking.
The bigger picture that the researchers are trying to point out is the potential flood risk this poses. They are essentially warning city planners to be aware that “every additional high-rise building constructed at coastal, river, or lakefront settings could contribute to future flood risk, and the mitigation strategies could contribute to future flood risk, and that mitigation strategies may need to be included.”
Flooding from two major hurricanes since 2012 cost the city billions, and with four of the five boroughs of New York located on islands, there’s a constant threat of flooding as sea levels rise.
And the slow-motion sinking of Manhattan is not helping matters.
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