Plant seeds being stored in bomb shelter in case of nuclear holocaust
As Clive Thompson reports, a group of nations is creating a concrete shelter where they’ll store millions upon millions of seeds. The reason? So if there’s some kind of world-ending nuclear holocaust, then we can go to this shelter to replenish the Earth’s biodiversity:
The high-security vault, almost half the length of a football field, will be carved into a mountain on a remote island above the Arctic Circle. If the looming fences, motion detectors and steel airlock doors are not disincentive enough for anyone hoping to breach the facility’s concrete interior, the polar bears roaming outside should help.
The more than 100 nations that have collectively endorsed the vault’s construction say it will be the most secure facility of its kind in the world. Given the stakes, they agree, nothing less would do.
Its precious contents? Seeds — millions and millions of them — from virtually every variety of food on the planet.
It would be really interesting if people did this with other things. For instance, a vault full of history books and copies of newspapers. Or the DNA of every kind of animal, so that one day we can clone them all again if they die in a disaster. They can even name it something clever, like “Noah’s vault.”
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