Aral Sea... the worst man-made environmental disaster
Between Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, there was a sea teeming with ships and life, since 1970 it began to dry up until it reached a stage of complete drought in 2008 and now it is called the graveyard of ships
The story of a sea dried up by Soviet cotton plantations The drying up of the Aral Sea in Central Asia is one of the greatest human-caused disasters.
In order to increase cotton production during the Soviet era, strict schemes were implemented to irrigate the fields, which led to the drying up of 90% of the Aral Sea, which was the fourth largest water body in the world.
The rusting remains of once-sunken boats now litter the sea floor, which is now desert.
The sea, which had an area of about 6 thousand square kilometers and a depth of 40 meters, evaporated, and today only 10% of that area remains.
And there were two rivers pouring into the sea, the first was the Sir Darya River from the north, while the other river was the Amu Darya from the south.
But the Soviets diverted the course of the two rivers to irrigate the cotton fields, and at that time they wanted to turn the Central Asian region into the largest producer of cotton in the world, and they succeeded in that during the eighties of the last century when Uzbekistan topped the cotton producers in the world.
With the passage of time and the shrinking of the sea area, the percentage of pesticides and chemicals that reach it concentrated, which led to the death of marine life and fish.
On the one hand, the Soviets developed the cotton industry, but their plans led to the destruction of the sea and its fish wealth.
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