Parts of Greater New Orleans are sinking by millimeters per year, increasing their vulnerability to floods and storm surges.
Flood protection infrastructure put in place in the months and years following Hurricane Katrina in 2005 could lose effectiveness more quickly than expected.
Though most of the city is stable, areas near the Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, sections of flood protection walls, and certain industrial sites and wetlands are losing elevation, researchers reported in Science Advances earlier this summer. The rate and scale of these losses vary because rates of subsidence are affected by multiple factors, including groundwater pumping, wetland drainage, construction and urban development, and natural soil compaction…