Climate threat to Stonehenge STONEHENGE could be toppled by moles and badgers if global temperatures continue to rise, a report has warned.
Changes to wildlife and its impacts on the landscape and the risk of more intense rainfall and flash flooding could undermine the world heritage site, as well as others such as Avebury, according to a study by the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), UN heritage body Unesco and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
The report warned of an “urgent and clear” need to limit temperature rises to protect key historic monuments.
It said: “The world’s most famous Stone Age monument is being managed to minimize the impacts of growing tourism and the site’s potential sensitivities to changes in the climate.
“The huge megaliths of bluestone and Wiltshire Sarsen, some weighing more than 40 tonnes, attract more than 1 million visitors a year. A recent climate vulnerability assessment identified a wide range of ways in which climate change could affect the site.
“Warmer winters are likely to bring higher populations of burrowing mammals including badgers, moles and rabbits, which may destabilise stonework and disturb buried archaeological deposits.
“Hotter drier summers could increase the number of visitors, and could change the plant species in the grassland that currently stabilise the site’s chalk downlands, exacerbating soil erosion problems.
“Of most concern for Stonehenge are increasing rainfall, more extreme rainfall events and worsening floods.
“Flash floods can result in damage through gullying and wetter conditions are also expected to increase the impact of visitors walking on the site.”
The report looked at 31 natural and cultural World Heritage sites in 29 countries that are vulnerable to increasing temperatures, melting glaciers, rising seas, more intense weather, worsening droughts and longer wildfire seasons.
Lead author of the report Adam Markham said: “The report is representative of the kind of threats these iconic places are experiencing, some are in direct and immediate danger.
“At every one of these sites we can see the impacts of climate change already. Not in every place is it threatening it yet but it will in the future.”
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