Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff, Lauren vogelbon here. For more than eight hundred years, a series of mesmerizing statues have towered over Rapa Nui, a remote island just fifteen miles that's twenty four kilometers wide in the southeast Pacific Ocean. These forty foot or twelve meter tall statues, known as the moai, have survived nearly a millennium, but the effects of climate change now threatened
to topple the island's mysterious ancient history. The nearly one thousand moai, erected between the tenth and sixteenth centuries on Rapa Nui, also named Easter Island by an eighteenth century Dutch explorer, are being battered by rising sea levels, high energy waves, and increased erosion. Ancient human remains are buried beneath many of the works, which appear as giant faces gazing over land and sea. We spoke with Adam Marken, Deputy director of Climate and Energy at the Union of
Concerned Scientists. He said some of the moai have been knocked over in the past, including by tsunamis, and they have been restored, so not every site is in pristine condition. The difference now is that the danger is even greater
the rate of change is faster than ever. The volcanic island of Rapa Nui, now part of Chile, is the most isolated inhabited land mass in the world, located some two thousand, two hundred miles that's three thousand, five hundred kilometers from Chile's mainland and some two thousand, five hundred
miles or four thousand kilometers east of Tahiti. Part of the vulnerability of Rapa Nui lies in the fact that it is an island, and many of the moai and the ahu or platforms on which they stand are perched around its edges. As Markham points out, all of the world's islands have been made vulnerable to erosion with rising ocean levels. Some climate models predict that increased melting of the world's ice sheets could cause oceans to rise by five to six feet that's one point five to one
point eight meters by the year twenty one hundred. Higher sea levels means shores face flooding and inundation by crashing waves. On Rapa Nui, signs of damage from the incoming waves is already apparent. On the island southern coast. Blocks of a ten foot that's three meter high stone wall at historical site or Orango Temhina toppled over last year. Beaches that used to be covered in pink sand have been eroded by waves, leaving behind rocks, and nearby burial sites
have been left exposed and vulnerable to erosion themselves. Conservationists are testing a newly built sea wall at one part of the island to see if it can offer protection, but it's not certain that walls can hold off the ocean's onslaught. Further inland, a site called Orango, which encircles a volcanic crater, also stands vulnerable two storms and erosion. Hieroglyphics at the crater site tell the tale of an annual relay race, and now landslides and erosion triggered by
storms threatened these stone carved images. As Markham points out, the increasing frequency of intense storms is another hallmark of climate change. He said, as you get more and more of these events, damage builds upon past damage. Moving the hieroglyphics and some of the most vulnerable noi into protected enclosures might help ensure their survival, but Relocating the statues could not only harm the works, it would disregard the role at many of the sites as burial markers for
remains of the islanders ancestors. The recognition of Rapa Nui National Park as a UNESCO World Heritage Site acknowledges the importance of the statutes preservation where they now stand. Markham said, it's the same problem that anyone would have when thinking about moving generations of history buried within a cemetery. A lot of very hard choices will have to be made, but I would doubt that much moving of artifacts will take place on Easter Island. This isn't the first time
the island has faced ecological destruction. Some have pointed to Easter Island's history as a cautionary environmental tale. Pollen grains found the island settlements suggested it was covered in a palm forest when it was first settled around twelve hundred CE. By the time a Dutch settler came upon the island's shores and the seventeen hundreds, he described the land as being of singular poverty and barrenness. What had happened to
the islands trees? One ecoside theory popularized by US biologist Jared Diamond in his two thousand five book Collapse, How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, suggests that the islands human population may have overexploited the land by cutting down most of its forests. The depletion of forests would have left soil vulnerable to erosion, making it difficult to plant crops.
That account, however, is still up for debate. Subsequent research has suggested that other factors, including the introduction of the Polynesian rat and shifts and climate, could have contributed to
the islands deforestation. Markham said there's a lot of ongoing argument about the island's history and what were the driving factors of its deforestation, but in general, there are hundreds of other places around the world where we can demonstrate that overusing resources and not caring for the landscape can lead to huge problems. Today, the island is mostly covered in meadow and is home to a year round population
of about five thousand, seven hundred people. The island's economy is totally dependent on tourism, and last year it was visited by some one hundred thousand people who spent more than seventy million dollars at local businesses. Economics are one part of what's at stake should the islands artifacts be destroyed by climate change. Perhaps even more profound is the vulnerability of a historic legacy that's vital not only to the people of Easter Island, but also to the world.
Markham said Easter Island matters to local people who live there, but is also a place of global heritage. The island carries an ability to connect with people's sense that it's important for all of humankind. Today's episode was written by Amanda Onion and produced by Tyler Clang, with kind engineering assistance by Ramsay Yacht. For more on this and lots of other environmental topics, visit our home planet, how stuff Works dot com.