Flood can cause a number of disasters including displacement of people, long term infrastructure failures, huge destructions to property damage.
When houses near coastal areas are always under constant threat, the iconic properties or monuments present around the flood zones are also in danger zone.
According to Aljazeera, the Journal of Cultural Heritage has published a new study indicating that rising sea levels could push powerful seasonal waves to Easter Island’s 15 most iconic moai statues in the latest potential risk peril to cultural heritage damage from global climate change.
In this regard Easter Island’s iconic moai statues face an existential threat from rising sea levels, with powerful seasonal waves predicted to inundate the colossal figures by the end of this century.
The research also warns that approximately 50 other cultural sites on the remote Pacific Island are at risk of flooding.
UNESCO report also indicates that around 50 World Heritage sites are highly exposed to coastal flooding.
“Sea level rise is real, It’s not a distant threat." said Noah Paoa, lead author of the study published on Wednesday, August 13, 2025. Noah is a doctoral student at the University of Hawaii at Manoa’s School of Ocean, Earth Science and Technology.
Easter Island is also known as "Rapa Nui" to its indigenous people. Noah and his team created a high-resolution “digital-twin” of the island’s eastern coastline, running computer models to stimulate future wave impacts under various sea level escalation scenarios.
The research journal findings indicate that waves could reach Ahu Tongarki,the islands largest ceremonial platform, as early as 2080.
The Easter Island site is considered as home to towering moai, which attracts tens of thousands of visitors annually and is crucial to the island’s tourism economy.
Beyond its economic value the Ahu Tongarki is deeply entwined with Rapa Nui’s cultural identity, lying within Rapa Nui National Park, a recognized UNESCO World Hertige site.
Moreover, the study states that roughly more than 900 statues across the island were carved by the Rapa Nui people between the 10th and 16th centuries to honor important ancestors and chiefs.
Researchers indicate that the threat is not unprecedented; a magnitude of 9.5 earthquake off the coast of Chile in 1960 triggered a tsunami that swept already-topped moai further island, damaging some features of the structures before the monuments were restored in the 1990s.
Furthermore, they suggested, possible way to mitigate the challenges or risk would be armoring the coastline and building the breakwaters to relocating the monuments.
Moai statues are massive, monolithic human figures carved from volcanic rocks on “Rapa Nui”, Easter Island created between 1400-1650DC.
Moreover, researchers claim that almost 900 moai statues were created with most standing on ceremonial platform called “ahu” facing inland.
These Rapa Nui statues appeared to be as large stylized heads with elongated ears, heavy brows and a thin-lipped pout.
Furthermore, the moai colossal figures are considered to be the most defining feature at the Rapa Nui national park and are believed to represent “Moai Aringa Ora“ meaning the living faces of ancestors, embodying their mana or spiritual power.