In the first half of the twentieth century, it was the world’s fourth-largest lake. By August 2009, virtually nothing remained of the largest lobe.
Published Aug 27, 2009
Acquired March 26, 2010, this natural-color image shows a plume rising from the eastern lobe of the South Aral Sea. The dust blows toward the southeast, along the Kazakhstan-Uzbekistan border.
Published Mar 30, 2010
Once part of the fourth-largest lake in the world, the eastern lobe of the southern Aral has dried up for the first time in modern history.
Published Sep 26, 2014
large dust storm blew westward from the Aral Sea in late April 2008. Dry lake bed sediments provide plentiful material to be blown by dust storms, and such sediments surround the Aral Sea.
Published Apr 29, 2008
This true-color image shows a dust storm blowing over the desiccated Southern Aral Sea in late June 2009. Dust blows over southern Kazakhstan and across Uzbekistan.
Published Jun 30, 2009
stronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) took this image of a major dust storm (image center and right) along the east side of the Aral Sea while passing over central Asia in the spring of 2007. The white, irregular lines along the bottom of the image are salt and clay deposits on the present coastline. The day that the ISS crew shot the image, winds were blowing from the west (lower left).
Published Nov 5, 2007
The North Aral Sea owes its rebirth to the Kok-Aral Dam, an $85.8 million project bolstered by a loan from the World Bank. The dam separates the North Aral Sea from its saltier and more polluted southern half. In early 2006, the Embassy of the Republic of Kazakhstan announced that the Aral Sea had shown dramatic recovery in just months, rather than the five to ten years originally predicted.
Published May 4, 2007
