A team of scientists has discovered that New York City is slowly sinking under its own weight, a common natural phenomenon where heavy objects like buildings gradually settle over time, but the researchers caution that it’s worth paying attention to.
A recent research paper published in the journal Earth’s Future Stady According to his calculations, the city is sinking slowly, at a rate of 1-2 millimeters per year, which doesn’t sound too terrifying, but this is average, some parts are sinking much faster than that. There could be several reasons for the decline, but in a city of this size, with such large buildings, it is not surprising.
In the research conducted by Parsons and his team, the total mass of more than 1 million buildings in New York was determined. The results showed that these The cumulative mass of the structures reached 764 billion kilograms. The researchers then divided the city into a square grid of 100 by 100 meters and calculated the downward pressure caused by the weight of the buildings, taking into account the force of gravity. After analyzing satellite data about Earth’s surface elevation, the researchers compared their models and mapped the city’s estimated subsidence.
In the future, increasing urbanization and groundwater drainage may exacerbate the subsidence, so scientists are already warning that action must be taken before it is too late.
