WEBVTT - Can We Save the Moai? 0:00:02.040 --> 0:00:07.080 Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff, 0:00:07.120 --> 0:00:10.119 Lauren vogelbon here. For more than eight hundred years, a 0:00:10.160 --> 0:00:13.880 series of mesmerizing statues have towered over Rapa Nui, a 0:00:13.920 --> 0:00:17.120 remote island just fifteen miles that's twenty four kilometers wide 0:00:17.239 --> 0:00:20.960 in the southeast Pacific Ocean. These forty foot or twelve 0:00:21.000 --> 0:00:24.120 meter tall statues, known as the moai, have survived nearly 0:00:24.160 --> 0:00:27.280 a millennium, but the effects of climate change now threatened 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:31.760 to topple the island's mysterious ancient history. The nearly one 0:00:31.800 --> 0:00:35.360 thousand moai, erected between the tenth and sixteenth centuries on 0:00:35.479 --> 0:00:38.680 Rapa Nui, also named Easter Island by an eighteenth century 0:00:38.760 --> 0:00:42.199 Dutch explorer, are being battered by rising sea levels, high 0:00:42.320 --> 0:00:46.360 energy waves, and increased erosion. Ancient human remains are buried 0:00:46.400 --> 0:00:49.360 beneath many of the works, which appear as giant faces 0:00:49.400 --> 0:00:52.960 gazing over land and sea. We spoke with Adam Marken, 0:00:53.200 --> 0:00:56.080 Deputy director of Climate and Energy at the Union of 0:00:56.120 --> 0:00:59.480 Concerned Scientists. He said some of the moai have been 0:00:59.520 --> 0:01:02.440 knocked over in the past, including by tsunamis, and they 0:01:02.480 --> 0:01:05.720 have been restored, so not every site is in pristine condition. 0:01:06.080 --> 0:01:08.560 The difference now is that the danger is even greater 0:01:08.840 --> 0:01:12.280 the rate of change is faster than ever. The volcanic 0:01:12.360 --> 0:01:14.880 island of Rapa Nui, now part of Chile, is the 0:01:14.920 --> 0:01:18.520 most isolated inhabited land mass in the world, located some 0:01:18.600 --> 0:01:21.480 two thousand, two hundred miles that's three thousand, five hundred 0:01:21.520 --> 0:01:24.600 kilometers from Chile's mainland and some two thousand, five hundred 0:01:24.680 --> 0:01:28.120 miles or four thousand kilometers east of Tahiti. Part of 0:01:28.120 --> 0:01:30.960 the vulnerability of Rapa Nui lies in the fact that 0:01:31.040 --> 0:01:33.560 it is an island, and many of the moai and 0:01:33.760 --> 0:01:36.959 the ahu or platforms on which they stand are perched 0:01:37.000 --> 0:01:40.120 around its edges. As Markham points out, all of the 0:01:40.160 --> 0:01:43.240 world's islands have been made vulnerable to erosion with rising 0:01:43.240 --> 0:01:46.640 ocean levels. Some climate models predict that increased melting of 0:01:46.680 --> 0:01:49.040 the world's ice sheets could cause oceans to rise by 0:01:49.040 --> 0:01:51.320 five to six feet that's one point five to one 0:01:51.320 --> 0:01:54.240 point eight meters by the year twenty one hundred. Higher 0:01:54.240 --> 0:01:58.000 sea levels means shores face flooding and inundation by crashing waves. 0:01:59.000 --> 0:02:01.840 On Rapa Nui, signs of damage from the incoming waves 0:02:01.920 --> 0:02:05.240 is already apparent. On the island southern coast. Blocks of 0:02:05.280 --> 0:02:07.760 a ten foot that's three meter high stone wall at 0:02:07.840 --> 0:02:12.080 historical site or Orango Temhina toppled over last year. Beaches 0:02:12.120 --> 0:02:13.920 that used to be covered in pink sand have been 0:02:13.919 --> 0:02:17.600 eroded by waves, leaving behind rocks, and nearby burial sites 0:02:17.600 --> 0:02:21.960 have been left exposed and vulnerable to erosion themselves. Conservationists 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:24.480 are testing a newly built sea wall at one part 0:02:24.480 --> 0:02:26.560 of the island to see if it can offer protection, 0:02:27.000 --> 0:02:29.120 but it's not certain that walls can hold off the 0:02:29.120 --> 0:02:33.680 ocean's onslaught. Further inland, a site called Orango, which encircles 0:02:33.680 --> 0:02:37.280 a volcanic crater, also stands vulnerable two storms and erosion. 0:02:37.720 --> 0:02:40.080 Hieroglyphics at the crater site tell the tale of an 0:02:40.080 --> 0:02:43.640 annual relay race, and now landslides and erosion triggered by 0:02:43.680 --> 0:02:47.639 storms threatened these stone carved images. As Markham points out, 0:02:47.840 --> 0:02:50.799 the increasing frequency of intense storms is another hallmark of 0:02:50.840 --> 0:02:53.560 climate change. He said, as you get more and more 0:02:53.560 --> 0:02:57.520 of these events, damage builds upon past damage. Moving the 0:02:57.560 --> 0:03:00.760 hieroglyphics and some of the most vulnerable noi into protected 0:03:00.800 --> 0:03:04.880 enclosures might help ensure their survival, but Relocating the statues 0:03:04.919 --> 0:03:07.360 could not only harm the works, it would disregard the 0:03:07.440 --> 0:03:09.600 role at many of the sites as burial markers for 0:03:09.760 --> 0:03:14.240 remains of the islanders ancestors. The recognition of Rapa Nui 0:03:14.400 --> 0:03:17.519 National Park as a UNESCO World Heritage Site acknowledges the 0:03:17.560 --> 0:03:21.880 importance of the statutes preservation where they now stand. Markham said, 0:03:21.960 --> 0:03:24.320 it's the same problem that anyone would have when thinking 0:03:24.360 --> 0:03:27.800 about moving generations of history buried within a cemetery. A 0:03:27.840 --> 0:03:30.040 lot of very hard choices will have to be made, 0:03:30.200 --> 0:03:32.359 but I would doubt that much moving of artifacts will 0:03:32.400 --> 0:03:35.839 take place on Easter Island. This isn't the first time 0:03:35.880 --> 0:03:39.120 the island has faced ecological destruction. Some have pointed to 0:03:39.160 --> 0:03:43.400 Easter Island's history as a cautionary environmental tale. Pollen grains 0:03:43.400 --> 0:03:45.720 found the island settlements suggested it was covered in a 0:03:45.760 --> 0:03:49.000 palm forest when it was first settled around twelve hundred CE. 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:51.240 By the time a Dutch settler came upon the island's 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:54.120 shores and the seventeen hundreds, he described the land as 0:03:54.160 --> 0:03:57.800 being of singular poverty and barrenness. What had happened to 0:03:57.800 --> 0:04:02.880 the islands trees? One ecoside theory popularized by US biologist 0:04:02.960 --> 0:04:06.240 Jared Diamond in his two thousand five book Collapse, How 0:04:06.320 --> 0:04:09.960 Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, suggests that the islands 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:13.280 human population may have overexploited the land by cutting down 0:04:13.320 --> 0:04:16.080 most of its forests. The depletion of forests would have 0:04:16.160 --> 0:04:19.799 left soil vulnerable to erosion, making it difficult to plant crops. 0:04:20.320 --> 0:04:23.720 That account, however, is still up for debate. Subsequent research 0:04:23.720 --> 0:04:26.520 has suggested that other factors, including the introduction of the 0:04:26.600 --> 0:04:29.719 Polynesian rat and shifts and climate, could have contributed to 0:04:29.800 --> 0:04:33.800 the islands deforestation. Markham said there's a lot of ongoing 0:04:33.880 --> 0:04:36.599 argument about the island's history and what were the driving 0:04:36.600 --> 0:04:40.039 factors of its deforestation, but in general, there are hundreds 0:04:40.040 --> 0:04:42.360 of other places around the world where we can demonstrate 0:04:42.440 --> 0:04:45.440 that overusing resources and not caring for the landscape can 0:04:45.520 --> 0:04:49.640 lead to huge problems. Today, the island is mostly covered 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:52.200 in meadow and is home to a year round population 0:04:52.279 --> 0:04:55.680 of about five thousand, seven hundred people. The island's economy 0:04:55.760 --> 0:04:58.640 is totally dependent on tourism, and last year it was 0:04:58.760 --> 0:05:01.520 visited by some one hundred thousand people who spent more 0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:05.320 than seventy million dollars at local businesses. Economics are one 0:05:05.360 --> 0:05:07.760 part of what's at stake should the islands artifacts be 0:05:07.839 --> 0:05:11.160 destroyed by climate change. Perhaps even more profound is the 0:05:11.200 --> 0:05:14.560 vulnerability of a historic legacy that's vital not only to 0:05:14.600 --> 0:05:16.920 the people of Easter Island, but also to the world. 0:05:17.600 --> 0:05:20.920 Markham said Easter Island matters to local people who live there, 0:05:21.080 --> 0:05:23.760 but is also a place of global heritage. The island 0:05:23.880 --> 0:05:26.320 carries an ability to connect with people's sense that it's 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:34.400 important for all of humankind. Today's episode was written by 0:05:34.400 --> 0:05:37.600 Amanda Onion and produced by Tyler Clang, with kind engineering 0:05:37.600 --> 0:05:40.280 assistance by Ramsay Yacht. For more on this and lots 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:43.440 of other environmental topics, visit our home planet, how stuff 0:05:43.440 --> 0:05:55.479 Works dot com.