Nearly a third of the Netherlands lies below sea level, and about 17 percent of its current landmass was reclaimed directly from the sea and lakes. The Dutch have essentially terraformed their own country over centuries. This relentless land reclamation led to the creation of Flevoland, a province officially established in 1986. Flevoland is the largest artificial island on Earth, covering over 370 square miles. Instead of dropping millions of tons of dirt onto the ocean floor to build an island, engineers constructed a massive dike around the shallow Zuiderzee inlet and relentlessly pumped the water out. By draining the ocean, they exposed the fertile sea floor beneath. People now live, farm, and drive on land that was completely underwater less than a century ago.
To protect this deeply sunken country, the Dutch constructed the Delta Works, a sprawling network of dams, sluices, locks, and barriers that is widely considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World. The crown jewel of this system is the Maeslantkering near Rotterdam.
- Massive Scale: The barrier consists of two immense steel gates, each roughly the same length as the Eiffel Tower is tall.
- Automated Defense: These gates rest on dry land during normal conditions so ships can pass into Europe's busiest port. However, they are entirely automated by a computer system that constantly monitors sea levels and weather data.
- Deployment: If a dangerous storm surge is detected, the massive robotic arms swing out over the water, flood their own ballast tanks to sink to the riverbed, and lock together to form a highly fortified shield against the North Sea.
The continuous survival of the nation relies on these pumping stations and automated defenses working around the clock to keep the ocean at bay.
