Is ‘mega’ project sunk?

Nosy Tarsee hears whispers that are growing louder around the nation’s most hyped mega project right now, which is supposed to be the jewel in the crown of a massive new city rising from the sea.

But insiders say the next crisis is never more than a high tide away, and right now the ground beneath it is literally sinking while floodwaters keep circling like sharks.

The people behind it ran their own numbers and swore sea levels would creep up a gentle 5.3 millimeters a year until 2050.

A handful of disaster-risk experts who actually know the local waters are calling that figure laughably low, as the actual level is closer to 13-15 millimeters annually in this stretch of coastline.

Something about ocean currents, melting ice sheets, and warmer water is changing how the sea behaves in one bay versus another.

Add the fact that this spot sits smack in a typhoon alley where storms regularly whip the ocean into a frenzy, and you’ve got a recipe for trouble.

The rain patterns here have already flipped: a bone-dry hot season followed by monsoon dumps that turn everything into a lake.

And because the whole area sits on the Ring of Fire, every tremor or quake could turn the soft clay and loose sand under the runways into quicksand. Engineers are throwing everything at it: rock walls, giant geogrids, cement columns, vibrating machines to pack the soil tighter, and they’re lifting the entire site four meters above sea level.

Still, one global watchdog after another is quietly saying the math is pure optimism. Some are warning the tarmac could be underwater or unusable within 30 years if the land continues to settle.

Then there’s the environmental body count. One of the country’s most vital coastal ecosystems is taking a hit that scientists fear will be permanent.

The developer points proudly to new mangrove plantings and bird platforms, but locals and marine biologists say the trees they chose are the wrong kind for these waters.

Meanwhile, more than 700 families, roughly 3,000 people, had already been moved out, many with little or nothing to show for it, their fishing livelihood wiped out along with the shoreline they depended on.

Cleverly, the project’s backers insist this isn’t a “land reclamation” at all — it’s “land development.”

Never mind the mountains of sand being dredged up from the bay and dumped on the site. That technicality apparently lets them sidestep stricter rules governing the construction of new islands in the sea.

Construction of the terminal itself is slated to kick off. Roads are already snaking toward the site. The bigger dream is a 12,000-hectare mini-city complete with homes, government offices, a port and factories — all for a cool $15 billion.

On paper, it sounds like the future. On the waterlogged ground, a growing chorus of engineers and scientists is betting it could be headed for serious turbulence long before the first plane ever lands.