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Photo: the incredible shrinking of the Aral Sea mongabay.com July 11, 2009
The Aral Sea was until recently the world's fourth-largest inland body of water (at 68,000 square kilometers), but has steadily disappeared since the 1960s due to water diversion for irrigation. By 2000 the sea had split in an eastern lobe and a western lobe. The new Envisat images show the eastern lobe, shared by Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, has lost about 80 percent of its surface area since 2006. The southern section of the sea is expected to dry out completely by 2020, according to ESA.
In an effort to reduce sandstorms and save at least some parts of the sea, local authorities have begun planting the lake bed with salt-tolerant vegetation and building dikes. Since its completion in 2005 the Kok-Aral dike, a joint project of the World Bank and the Kazakhstan government, has shored up the northern section of the sea, causing the water level to rise by an average of 4 m. But the dike has come at a cost: it has diverted water from the southern portion of the sea, accelerating drying.
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