Philae Island Temple of Isis Relocated: UNESCO project Save the Treasures of Nubia 60 years

An island in the reservoir of the Aswan Low Dam, downstream of the Aswan Dam, Egypt. Philae was originally located near the expansive First Cataract of the Nile. In 1960 UNESCO started a project to try to save the buildings on the island from the destructive effect of the everincreasing waters of the Nile. First, building three dams and creating a separate lake with lower water levels was considered. First of all, a large coffer dam was built, constructed of two rows of steel plates between which a 1 million cubic metres (35 million cubic feet) of sand was tipped. Any water that seeped through was pumped away. Next the monuments were cleaned and measured, by using photogrammetry, a method that enables the exact reconstruction of the original size of the building blocks that were used by the ancients. Then every building was dismantled into about 40, 000 units, and then transported to the nearby Island of Agilkia, situated on higher ground some 500 metres (1, 600 ft) away.