{"id":779489,"date":"2026-05-07T11:08:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-07T11:08:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/779489\/"},"modified":"2026-05-07T11:08:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-07T11:08:16","slug":"up-to-2cm-a-month-nasa-keeps-track-as-mexico-city-sinks-into-the-ground-mexico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/779489\/","title":{"rendered":"Up to 2cm a month: Nasa keeps track as Mexico City sinks into the ground | Mexico"},"content":{"rendered":"

Walking into Mexico<\/a> City\u2019s sprawling central Z\u00f3calo is a dizzying experience. At one end of the plaza, the capital\u2019s cathedral, with its soaring spires, slumps in one direction. An attached church, known as the Metropolitan Sanctuary, tilts in the other. The nearby National Palace also seems off-kilter.<\/p>\n

The teetering of many of the capital\u2019s historic buildings is the most visible sign of a phenomenon that has been ongoing for more than a century: Mexico City is sinking at an alarming rate.<\/p>\n

Now, the metropolis\u2019s descent is being tracked in real time thanks to one of the most powerful radar systems ever launched into space. Known as Nisar, the satellite can detect minute changes in Earth\u2019s surface, even through thick vegetation or cloud cover.<\/p>\n

\u201cNisar takes radar imaging observations of Earth to the next level,\u201d said Marin Govor\u010din, a scientist at Nasa\u2019s jet propulsion laboratory. \u201cNisar will see any change big or small that happens on Earth from week to week. No other imaging mission can claim this.\u201d<\/p>\n

A building affected by the subsidence. Photograph: Ross D Franklin\/AP<\/p>\n

Though not the first time that Mexico City\u2019s sinking has been observed from space<\/a>, the Nisar mission has provided a greater sense of how far the sinking spreads and how it changes across different types of land than any other space-based sensor. It has also been able to penetrate areas on the outskirts of the city that were previously challenging to study because of the complex terrain.<\/p>\n

The implications of the imagery extend far beyond the Mexican capital. \u201cThis study of Mexico City speaks to the realm of possibilities that will open up thanks to the Nisar system,\u201d said Dar\u00edo Solano-Rojas, an engineer at Mexico\u2019s National Autonomous University (Unam). \u201cAnd not just for sinking cities but also for studying volcanoes, for studying the deformation associated with earthquakes, for studying landslides.\u201d<\/p>\n

A map of land subsidence in Mexico City using data from the Nisar mission between October 2025 and January 2026. Dark blue indicates areas found to be subsiding by more than 2cm a month. Photograph: NISAR<\/p>\n

According to Nasa, the technology is also capable of monitoring the climate crisis, glacier sliding, agricultural productivity, soil moisture, forestry, coastal flooding and more.<\/p>\n

\u201cImages like this are just the beginning,\u201d said David Bekaert, a project manager at the Flemish Institute for Technological Research and a member of the Nisar science team. \u201cWe\u2019re going to see an influx of new discoveries from all over the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Nisar system, a joint initiative between Nasa and the Indian Space Research Organization, found that some areas of Mexico City, including at the city\u2019s main airport, were sinking by more than 2cm a month, one of the fastest subsidence rates in the world.<\/p>\n

Among the clearest examples of this rapid descent is the Angel of Independence statue on the city\u2019s main Paseo de la Reforma avenue. Built in 1910 to commemorate 100 years of Mexican independence, the 36-metre monument has had 14 steps added to its base as the land around it has gradually sunk.<\/p>\n

The Mexican former footballer Diego Ivan Carmona in front of the Angel of Independence in Mexico City last month. Photograph: Yuri Cort\u00e9z\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

But the impact of Mexico City\u2019s subsidence can be seen across the metropolis of about 22 million people, from tilting buildings to warping roads and damages to the underground metro system.<\/p>\n

Efra\u00edn Ovando Shelley, another engineer at Unam, said: \u201cIt affects the entire urban infrastructure of the city: the streets, the pipes for water distribution, the water supply, the drainage pipes.\u201d<\/p>\n

First documented in 1925, the city\u2019s sinking is a result of centuries of exploitation of the groundwater. Because Mexico City and its surrounds were built on an ancient lake bed, the soil beneath the city is extremely soft. When water is pumped out of the aquifer below, this clay-like earth compacts, resulting in a city that is quietly sinking.<\/p>\n

Govor\u010din said: \u201cMexico City is subsiding primarily due to pumping of groundwater from the aquifer below the city at a rate that far exceeds natural recharge from precipitation. As water is withdrawn, the aquifer compacts under the weight of the city above it.\u201d<\/p>\n

A tour guide pointing out uneven buildings and subsidence at Templo Mayor back in 2016. Photograph: Ross D Franklin\/AP<\/p>\n

The underground aquifer still contributes<\/a> about half of the capital\u2019s water supply. As pumping of the groundwater has increased, the aquifer\u2019s shrinking has intensified, with the water table now contracting by about 40cm a year.<\/p>\n

This creates a vicious cycle: as the city sinks in on itself, the ageing pipes that pump water across the urban centre end up cracked and broken, with the capital losing an estimated 40%<\/a> of its water due to leakage. Add to that the climate crisis, which has resulted in years of low rainfall, and the metropolis may be hurtling towards a disaster<\/a> scenario in which taps in swaths of the city run dry.<\/p>\n

As for the city\u2019s gradual descent, there have been limited efforts to tackle the problem beyond fortifying the foundations of ancient buildings. Experts say the Nisar imagery will help draw greater attention to the issue, although actually halting the descent will be a challenging task.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo stop the sinking, we would have to stop water extraction,\u201d Shelley said. \u201cAnd if we stop water extraction, what water are we going to drink? The standard joke is that if we can\u2019t drink water, well, let\u2019s drink tequila.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Walking into Mexico City\u2019s sprawling central Z\u00f3calo is a dizzying experience. At one end of the plaza, the…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":779490,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[159,783,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-779489","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-space","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-unitedstates","12":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116532983128367189","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/779489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=779489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/779489\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/779490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=779489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=779489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=779489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}