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  • RESEARCH HIGHLIGHT

Global cities are sinking — and humans are partly to blame

Some coastal cities are subsiding by dozens of millimetres per year, making them even more vulnerable to sea-level rise triggered by climate change.
People wade through a flooded street after heavy rains triggered floods in Karachi.

People slosh down a flooded street in the port city of Karachi, Pakistan, which is sinking by more than 10 millimetres per year. Credit: Asif Hassan/AFP via Getty

Many coastal cities around the world are sinking as sea levels rise, a combination of trends that drastically increases the risk of urban flooding1.

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Nature 604, 10 (2022)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-022-00911-z

References

  1. Wu, P.-C., Wei, M. (M.) & D’Hondt, S. Geophys. Res. Lett. https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL098477 (2022).

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