Northern Ireland. The Chaussée des Géants (Giant’s Causeway) is the first North Irish site to have been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage in 1986. But because of tourism, the basalt columns of this 60 million year old site are threatened. By superstition or to make a wish, visitors leave parts in the rocky formation, which causes the stone crumbling. “The parts rust and swell until they reach three times their original thickness, which exerts enormous pressure on the surrounding rock”, Specifies Doctor Cliff Henry, head of awareness of nature for the Chaussée des Géants, on the National Trust site (the organization of protection of monuments and sites in charge of the site). These columns located at the edge of the Atlantic Ocean, the pieces stuck in the rock are exposed to salt spray – of fine seawater droplets carried by the wind – and undergo an accelerated corrosion. Their decomposition also leaves unsightly traces of copper, nickel and iron oxide on hexagonal volcanic formations.
The Chaussée des Géants, in Ireland.
Faced with this situation, the National Trust has requested the expertise of specialists in the conservation of the rock in order to extract as many parts as possible without causing additional damage in ten tests on the site. Building on the success of this initiative, the organization launched an operation – at a cost of 30,000 pounds (€ 35,000) – to withdraw the remaining parts. In parallel, the organization has set up an awareness campaign to dissuade tourists from reproducing this gesture. “We hope that if visitors see fewer parts in the rocks and hear the calls to end this harmful practice, the problem may be resolved”, Indicates Cliff Henry.
In 2024, the Chaussée des Géants hosted around 684,000 visitors, according to BBC figures. Before the COVVI-19 pandemic in 2019, nearly a million people went there. The site remains one of the most visited tourist places in Northern Ireland.
