ALEXANDRIA, Egypt —
Alexandria, Egypt’s fabled second city and its
biggest port, is in danger of disappearing below the waves within decades.
اضافة اعلان
With its land
sinking, and the sea rising due to global warming, the metropolis Alexander the
Great founded on the Nile Delta is teetering on the brink.
Even by the
UN’s
best case scenario, a third of the city will be underwater or uninhabitable by
2050, with 1.5 million of its 6 million people forced to flee their homes.
Its ancient
ruins and historic treasures are also in grave danger from the Mediterranean.
Already hundreds
of Alexandrians have had to abandon apartments weakened by flooding in 2015 and
again in 2020.
Every year the
city sinks by more than three millimeters, undermined by dams on the Nile that
hold back the river silt that once consolidated its soil and by gas extraction
offshore.
Meanwhile, the
sea is rising.
The
Mediterranean could rise a meter within the next three decades, according to
the most dire prediction of the UN’s panel of climate experts, the IPCC.
That would
inundate “a third of the highly productive agricultural land in the Nile
Delta”, as well as “cities of historical importance, such as Alexandria”, it
said.
Third of city could
go
UN experts say the
Mediterranean will rise faster than almost anywhere else
in the world.
“Climate change
is a reality and no longer an empty threat,” said Ahmed Abdel Qader, the head
of the authority protecting Egypt’s coastline.
Even under the
best-case scenario outlined by other Egyptian and UN studies, the Mediterranean
will rise 50cm by 2050.
That would leave
30 percent of Alexandria flooded, a quarter of the population having to be
rehoused and 195,000 jobs lost.
Such a
catastrophe will have dramatic repercussions for
Egypt’s 104 million people
because “Alexandria is also home to the country’s biggest port” and is one of
the main hubs of the economy, Abdel Qader said.
Across the
Delta, the sea has already advanced inland more than three kilometers since the
1960s, swallowing up Rosetta’s iconic 19th-century lighthouse in the 1980s.
All this is
happening as Alexandria’s population is exploding, with nearly two million more
people arriving in the last decade, while investment in infrastructure, as
elsewhere in Egypt, has lagged.
The city’s
governor, Mohamed al-Sharif, said the drainage system for its roads was built
to absorb 1 million cubic meters of rain. But with the more violent storms that
have come with climate change, “today we can get 18 million cubic meters
falling in a single day”.
The changing
climate is also playing havoc with Alexandria’s weather, which can veer from
unseasonal heat to snow.
“We have never
experienced such heat at the end of October,” resident Mohamed Omar, 36, told
AFP, with the temperature rising to 26°C, 5°C above normal.
‘Lost beneath the
waves’
The looming threat has also been a hammer blow to the image of a city
that likes to celebrate its cosmopolitan golden age at the start of the 20th
century, with its art deco cafes and elegant avenues of Paris-style apartment
buildings.
Many Egyptians
were horrified when Britain’s then-prime minister Boris Johnson warned that
Alexandria was at risk of being lost “beneath the waves” at the
COP26 climate change conference in Glasgow last year.
“Yes, the threat
exists and we don’t deny it, but we’re launching projects to attenuate it,”
Abdel Qader said.
A huge belt of
reeds is being planted along 69km of coastline. “Sand sticks around them and
together they form a natural barrier,” he said.
Alert mechanisms and wave measuring systems are also
soon to be put in place, Abdel Qader added.
Treasures in
jeopardy
Alexandria’s rich and ancient heritage is particularly vulnerable. Most
exposed is the 15th-century Mamluk citadel of Qaitbay, built on a neck of land
that was once the site of the Lighthouse of Alexandria, one of the seven
wonders of the ancient world.
Lashed
relentlessly by the sea, a breakwater made up of 5,000 huge concrete blocks has
been installed to protect it.
More have been
put in place to limit damage to the 19th-century corniche.
Destruction and
rebuilding is nothing new to a city that once was home to the Library of
Alexandria, the world’s greatest temple of knowledge until it was accidentally
burned by
Julius Caesar’s troops.
Neither its
modern heir, a gleaming edifice on the corniche tilting like a solar disc
toward the Mediterranean, nor the rest of the city can be left to a watery
grave, Abdel Qader insisted.
“The West has a
moral responsibility: it must help to counter the negative effects of climate
change, which are the result of its civilization” and industrialized model.
And Egypt will be
hammering that message home when the UN COP27 climate talks open there on
November 6.
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