A series of artificial islands are in the works to save the Indian Ocean nation of the Maldives, as the destructive force of runaway climate change continues to place the country in peril.
The Maldives is comprised of some 1,192 islands with a population of around 330,000 citizens. The country has an average elevation of only five feet above sea level, making it the lowest in the world. In recent years, rapidly rising sea levels due to indisputable climate change have threatened the nation's very existence. The 2004 Boxing Day tsunami cataclysm nearly washed the islands away, and the residents have watched as their beloved homeland—long a popular tourist destination with over two million visitors a year— has begun to be reclaimed into the Indian Ocean.
A Dutch construction company has now announced an ambitious plan to save the nation from extinction by building a series of artificial islands that will be attached to the seabed floor with cables or mooring piles. The islands will be designed and constructed in India or another location in the Middle East and then towed to their new home in the Maldives.
The first "island" to be constructed will be a mammoth, $600 million, 18 hole golf course (obviously, the most important thing to the people of a nation facing eradication would be a golf course...). The plan would include the construction of an additional 41 islands, which would give the first entire nation victimized by the effects of climate change a chance at remaining in their homeland.
Development on the golf course is expected to begin later this year, and it should be ready for play by the end of 2013 ahead of a full launch in 2015, so no tourists will have to fear they will lose any precious time on the greens...
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