One of the worlds largest cities is sinking by nearly a foot annually — risking displacement of millions of citizens

North America’s largest city is experiencing a slump … literally.

Mexico City is reportedly sinking at such a rapid rate that its descent is visible from space.

Satellite photos by NASA have shown that the Mexican metropolis is subsiding at a rate of nearly 10 inches per year, making it one of the fastest-sinking cities in the world — which could threaten its foundation, the AP reported.

Two people standing outside a sinking building in Mexico City. AP

“It’s a very big problem,” said Enrique Cabral, a researcher studying geophysics at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. “It damages part of the critical infrastructure of Mexico City, such as the subway, the drainage system, the water, the potable water system, housing and streets.”

Home to over 22 million people and spanning 3,000 square miles, Mexico City was originally erected on an ancient lake bed, a foundation evident in the fact that many of its streets were formerly canals, the Independent reported.

Due to a combination of groundwater pumping and extensive urban development, the aquifer has been drained to the point of near-depletion, causing the city to be on the literal decline for over a century. The city was subsiding at roughly two inches per year in the late 1800s; by 1950, that number had jumped to 18, ABC News reported.

In total, some areas have sunk by hundreds of feet, in total while there’s been a notable tilt in historic structures like the Metropolitan Cathedral, which began construction in 1573.

New data from NISAR shows where Mexico City and its environs subsided by up to a few centimeters per month (shown in blue) between Oct. 25, 2025, and Jan. 17, 2026. NASA/JPL-Caltech/David Bekaert

While it’s long been known that Mexico City was one of the fastest-sinking cities, researchers were unable to continuously monitor how much it sank — until now.

To gauge its rate of subsidence, researchers relied on measurements taken by a powerful NASA satellite known as NISAR between October 2025 and January 2026.

This frequency of data collection allowed researchers to record ground movement changes from space every 12 days, essentially allowing scientists to see what was transpiring underneath in close to real time.

They found that some parts of the city, including the central airport and the Angel of Independence monument, are experiencing a subsidence rate of 0.78 inches per month.

This amounts to a rate of 9.5 inches annually, meaning that in less than a hundred years, these regions have plunged over 39 feet. In some areas, the elevation change has been as much as 127 feet.

“It’s basically documentation of all of these changes within a city,” said NISAR scientist Paul Rosen while describing the efficacy of the space-based recon. “You can see the full magnitude of the problem.”

The extent of the devastation is evident in the Iztapalapa region — one of the hardest hit.

“The houses that are founded in [volcanic] rock are stable, but the houses in the middle between the rock and the lacustrine plain are already broken, most of them,” Mexico City subsidence expert Carreón-Freyre told ABC News. “In 2017, a taxi fell into a fracture.” 

Sinking isn’t the only issue, either. Experts fear that the shrinking aquifer could also result in a major water shortage.

In the future, the team hopes to get a snapshot of the subsidence rates on a building-by-building basis, which will provide key intel on how they can mitigate the damage.

“To do long-term mitigation of the situation,” Cabral said, “the first step is to just understand.”