Aral Sea - What Was and What Is

Aral Sea - What Was and What Is

Aral Sea—What Was and What Is

Since the very beginning of its existence, the human being has been

developing. It has never stopped, and it never will. During the last

couple of centuries it has been developing very aggressively, and it has

reached tremendous achievements in all fields. Unfortunately mankind has

achieved tremendous success in polluting its environment also. Nowadays,

nature is missing many of its inhabitants: – those who are supposed to be

under the protection of humans as young brothers and sisters. Pollution was

the reason for their extinction. Finally, the humanity started paying more

attention to what surrounds it. It started thinking about the future, its

future generations, and the inheritance to these generations. People have

started asking themselves more often questions like, “What will we have

left to other children after us?” Currently, humanity has plenty of global

environmental problems that it has to take care of now. Tomorrow will be

too late. Some of these global environmental problems are global warming,

deforestation, freshwater contamination, destruction of ozone layer of the

earth, pollution of space orbit of the earth by parts of used equipment.

Desiccation of the Aral Sea is one of the items on the list.

The Aral Sea, which is also considered to be a lake or Inland Sea in

Central Asia, is located in southwestern Kazakstan and northwestern

Uzbekistan, near the Caspian Sea. The Aral has no outlet. The Aral Sea is

still listed as the fourth largest lake in the world. But it has been

shrinking for decades, and the statistics might change. In time the Aral

Sea may not the fourth largest lake in the world anymore.

Nowadays, two major problems have risen before the governments of

Uzbekistan and Kazakstan; the desiccation and as a result of this threat of

the complete disappearance of the sea, and the danger of the broad

extension of anthrax bacteria that was stored by the Soviet Army

Vozrozdenia Island.

In comparison with the size of the sea in the 1960’s, the Sea has

declined in size by seventy-six percent. The initial reason for the Aral’s

decline is the fact that Soviet planners diverted water from Aral’s two big

feeding rivers (Amu Darya and Syr Darya) into cotton fields in the

territory of Uzbekistan. Because of this irrigation, the sea is now seventy

miles away from its former bank (in some places even more). Ninety percent

of the Syr Daya’s water is diverted into canals and reservoirs. Millions

of people in Central Asia rely on the rivers for a livelihood. Uzbekistan,

for instance, generates twenty-eight percent of its hard currency from

cotton irrigated with river water (The Aral Sea,

http:///visearth.ucsd.edu/VisE_Int/aralsea/).

Planning the irrigation system, the Soviet planners were only after

high rates of cotton harvests. Unwise use of water has led to the current

state of the Aral Sea. The salt content of the Sea’s waters increased by

about threefold, adversely affecting plant and animal life and causing the

fishing industry to decline.

The disappearance of the sea as a part of the ecosystem is just one

problem that is followed by hundreds of subsequent problems. One of them

has already risen: The drying of the sea has left behind three million

hectares of desiccated seabed, covered with accumulated salts which the

wind carries away and deposits over thousands of square kilometers of

arable land turning the land into dead ones. One can see white ridges amid

the soil in the field. Salty dust from the dried out land blows in squalls

through the area, causing discomfort and respiratory problems. Wind brings

more than a hundred tons of salty dust per square mile on the region every

year. As a result of this, trees do not bear fruit any more.

The Aral Sea’s desiccation has an influence on everything that is

around it. The climate in the region has changed significantly; the

winters are even colder, summers are even hotter.

The sea was not only the water supply for the population, but it was

the source of their income. A large part of the population was involved

in fishing and resort industries. Now, that the Sea is far away, these

businesses are no longer available, and that leads to deterioration of the

financial situation of the people in the area.

“In city of Muynak, the three hundred-vessel fleet once employed a thousand

fishermen. It is now a collection of rusting hulls half-buried amid the

dunes on the edge of town. Yet the sixty-year-old canning factory still

clatters, all steam and stench, although its seven hundred workers handle

fish brought by lorry from the lakes around Tashkent, one thousand miles

away” (Reeves, The Sea Sickness).

The sea has turned from a rich fishing ground to a prairie of poison

dust. Desiccation has a great deal of influence on the population’s

health; the change in environment has significantly increased rates of

birth defects, infant mortality, cancers, malnutrition, respiratory

diseases, and the anemia suffered by almost all women of child-bearing age.

Malnutrition has risen sharply; fish is no longer a part of the people’s

daily diet. Another side effect imposed on the population is a

dramatically increased rate of tuberculosis in the area.

One of the causes of health deterioration is that over three decades

the water could not or barely could make it to the Aral Sea. The Aral’s

water contains a lot of pesticides. The pesticides sank to the bottom of

the lake. As the lake dried up, this layer of pesticide became exposed to

the wind, which blows it away on the other lands.

The partial solution for the problem is to build a dam to keep water

from flowing into the larger, southern portion. Plans call for the

structure’s base to be 150 yards wide. If money is found for the

construction, the water level of the northern sea will rise to the same

level it was in 1960’s. As a result of the construction, salination of the

sea will decrease. This fact might contribute to restoration of fishing

and resort industries.

For the population of this region, the dam is a rare ray of hope. If

the dam holds on the small sea, a microclimate will be restored there. The

health of people will improve and it will be good for the economy.

Calculations by the Kazak Academy of Science in Almaty, the country’s

main commercial city, suggest the entire sea might disappear by 2010

without the dam. Currently the northern Sea is one-sixth as large as the

southern portion. If the surface area is reduced, less water will

evaporate. The full damage caused cannot be repaired, but it can be stopped

from going any further.

The second threat to the Aral Sea and its inhabitants is anthrax

bacteria stored 1988 by the Soviet Army. The Army was trying to get rid of

its germ weapons and stored the bacteria on one of the Aral’s islands.

Soldiers dug large pits and poured a mixture of anthrax bacteria and

bleach. The bleach was supposed to kill the bacteria, but it did not.

Even with the passage of time, the bacteria stay alive.

Now, the Sea is drying out and this island can become a part of land.

This fact carries the threat that anthrax bacteria can be exposed to

atmosphere one day, and it will become a very serious danger to both

countries.

At this time, both governments in cooperation with the United States

are undertaking actions in order to prevent the extension of the bacteria.

Over the two last centuries many of Earth’s inhabitants became extinct

as a result of environmental pollution. It is time to stop it; otherwise

the next extinct inhabitant might turn out to be humanity itself.

Works cited

R.J. Bennet and R.J.Chorley. “Environmental Systems.” Princeton:

Princeton University Press, 1978

Sulvan J.Kaplan, Ph.D. Evelyn Kivy – Rosenberg, Ph.D. “Ecology and The

Quality of Life.” Illinois: Publisher spring field, 1973

Andrew, Goudie. “The Human Impact.” Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT

Press, 1981

John, Passmore. “Man’s Responsobility for Nature.” New York: Charles

Scribner’s Sons, 1974

Robin, Butlim A, and Neil Roberts. “Ecological Relations in Historical

Times.” London: The Institute of British Geographers, 1985.

Sue Loyd-Robers. “Kazakhs Struggle to Refill their Lost Sea; Draining the

Aral Destroyed a Way of Life.” Newspaper Publishing PLC, London: The

Independent.

Phill, Reeves “The Sea Sickness.” Newspaper Publishing PLC, London: The

Independent, March 6, 1999.

Graham, Hugles. “Scientists Fight to Save the Aral Sea: Desappearing Lake

Waters Leave Disease, Poverty in Wake.” Southan Inc. The Ottawa

Citizen, January 30, 1999.

Ganiel, Williams. “The Sinking Sea; Dike Splitting Kazakhstan’s Aral Dims

Hopes for Its Salvation.” The Washington Post, November 1, 1998.

The Aral Sea. www.southampton.ac.uk/%7Eengenvir/water/aral.sea.php

The Aral Sea. http://visearth.ucsd.edu/VisE_Int/aralsea

Water Features and Water Issues: Aral Sea.

http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/newsletter/html_mir/aral.php

Children’s Response to the Aral Sea Problem

http://solar.rtd.utk.edu/partners/ccsi/announce/perzconf.php