One of the World's Largest Flood-Defense Systems

Built after catastrophic flooding in 1953, the Delta Works is a network of dams, sluices, storm surge barriers, and dikes across the Dutch Rhine-Meuse-Scheldt delta, completed in 1997 and named one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World by American civil engineers. Its centerpiece, the Oosterscheldekering storm surge barrier, is among the largest movable flood barriers on Earth.