Today we visited the Delta Works. The Delta Works is a set of dams, dikes, and storm surge barriers in the Netherlands that were started to be built after the disastrous flood of 1953. Construction on the Delta Works lasted from 1954 to 1997. The goal of the Delta Works was to shorten the coastline and make it easier to prevent large amounts of water from flooding land like it did in 1953. In order to do this, some of the engineered solutions were incredibly innovative and impressive.

To visit the Delta Works, we went to Delta Park Neeltje Jans, which is an amusement park. It has a museum that tells about the 1953 flood and how the Delta Works were created, and it has several other fun things around it like a playground, an aquarium, a bounce pad, and a sea lion exhibit. We first took a tour of the museum itself. We were explained to about how the main storm surge barrier that was closest to us was created. The project started by stabilizing the seabed and laying down a specially designed mattress to form a solid base. Part of the way they did this was by using huge rocks. One part of equipment that they used to move the rocks is shown below. It was a giant piece of machinery. Large concrete pillars were then constructed on land, and were then transported by floating them to the site and carefully sinking them onto the prepared mattresses. They navigated where to put the pillars solely by using markers and the stars. Once the foundation pillars were in place, the gates were installed and roadways were built on top.

The creation of the Delta Works at the time may not have been sustainable, but over time it has saved many lives of both humans, animals, and much land. It has paid for its lack of sustainability by allowing the Netherlands to incorporate sustainability into their new innovations in the present day.

After the tour of the museum from the guide, we had a nice boat ride on the water where we got to see some good views of the massive storm surge barrier. We also went to the aquarium to see some fish, and we went to the sea lion exhibit. The sea lion was the best part of the day. We sat and watched it leap into and out of the water over and over. Its trainer took it through a whole routine. It followed directions incredibly well, and it was adorable. Overall, today was a very interesting and memorable day.