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ON THE BED OF THE ARAL SEA 4 CITY SOLEIL 13 ARAL ATLANTIS 12 Si t out v a b i e n, Ar a l s k re d e v i e ndr a un por t e n 2011” . THE HISTORY OF THE ARAL SEA 2 DrY Tears DrY Tears RUSSIA N ew s l ette r #9 S e p te mb e r 2009 EVAPORATION OF THE ARAL SEA 11 UNUSUAL WAVE CLOUDS OVER THE ARAL SEA 11 LE MYSTÈRE DES TEMPÊTES 14 DE POUSSIÈRE DE LA MER DARAL

News letter 09.2009

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Page 1: News letter 09.2009

ON THE BEDOF THE ARAL SEA 4

CITY SOLEIL 13

ARAL ATLANTIS 12

“…Si tout va bien, Aralsk redeviendra un port en 2011”.

THE HISTORYOF THE ARAL SEA 2

DrY TearsDrY Tears

RUSSIA

N e w s l e t t e r # 9S e p t e m b e r 2 0 0 9

EVAPORATIONOF THE ARAL SEA 11UNUSUAL WAVE CLOUDSOVER THE ARAL SEA 11

LE MYSTÈRE DES TEMPÊTES 14DE POUSSIÈREDE LA MER D’ARAL

Page 2: News letter 09.2009

Process drying of Aral Sea

Millions of years ago, thenorthwestern part ofUzbek istan and southernKazakhstan were coveredby a massive inland sea.When the waters receded,they left a broad plain ofhighly saline soil. One ofthe remnants of theancient sea was the Ara lSea , the fourth largestinland body of water in theworld.

The Aral is an inland salt-water sea with no outlet. Itis fed by two rivers, theAmu Darya and Syr Darya.The fresh water from thesetwo rivers held the Aral'swater and salt levels in per-fect balance.

In the early 1960's, the Soviet central government decided to make theSoviet Union self-sufficient in cotton and increase rice production.Government officials ordered the additional amount of needed water tobe taken from the two rivers that feed the Aral Sea.

Large dams were built across both rivers, and an 850-mile central canalwith a far-reaching system of " feeder" canals was created. When the irri-gation system was completed, millions of acres along both sides of themain canal were flooded.

Over the next 30 years, the Aral Sea experienced a severe drop in waterlevel, its shoreline receded, and its salt content increased. The marine environment became hostile to the sea life in it, killing theplants and animals. As the marine life died, the fishing industry suffered.

The Soviet scheme was based on the construction of a series of dams onthe two rivers to create reservoirs from which 40.000 km of canals wouldeventually be dug to divert water to the fields. The fields flourished butwith such vast areas of monoculture, farmers had to use massiveamounts of chemical pesticides. And with irrigation, salt was drawn tothe surface of the soil and accumulated. When the Tahaitash Dam wasbuilt on the Amu Darya near the city of Nukus, there was no water left inthe riverbed to flow to the Aral Sea, hundreds of kilometers away. To thesurprise of the inhabitants of Muynak, the Aral Sea began to shrink.

At first, they assumed it was a temporary condition and dredged a canalto the receding shore so boats could continue to ply the sea and stilldock at the wharves. But the effluents that did reach the sea were lacedwith a deadly mix of salt and pesticides from the cotton fields. Fish popu-lations plummeted and eventually, when the canal was 30 km long andthe sea continued to move away, the boats were abandoned to lie likegreat leviathans on sands that were once sea bottom.

The Aral Sea was a rich source of fish. Some 20 species were identified bybiologists, including sturgeon and catfish. The town of Muynak, locatedon the edge of the sea, was a fishing town that also attracted tourists toits seaside vistas. In the 1950's, the Soviet Union decided the great plainswere ideal for growing cotton. The critical factor to make it happen waswater. Two great rivers feed the Aral Sea, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya.

Today, Muynak is a desert town more than a hundred kilometers fromthe sea. The only reminders of the once thriving fishing activity are therusting hulks of ships and an ancient fish plant. The sea has shrunk totwo-fifths of its original size and now ranks about 10th in the world. Thewater level has dropped by 16 metres and the volume has been reducedby 75 percent, a loss equivalent to the water in both Lakes Erie andHuron. The ecological effect has been disastrous and the economic,social and medical problems for people in the region catastrophic. All 20known fish species in the Aral Sea are now extinct, unable to survive thetoxic, salty sludge.

Changes to one part of a region often lead to other changes. Here aresome of the results of the shrinking of the Aral Sea: • As water has been drained from the rivers for cotton farming, the sea's

water has become much saltier.

About the Aral Sea disaster. Map of the Aral Sea. Pictures of the Aral Sea. Tourism & travel to the dying Aral Sea. The Aral Sea basin. Where is the Aral Sea?

The water that serveth all that country is drawn by ditches out of the River Oxus, into the great destruction of the said river, for which it cause it fal-leth not into the Caspian Sea as it hath done in times past, and in short time all that land is like to be destroyed, and to become a wilderness forwant of water, when the river of Oxus shall fail.

Anthony Jenkinson, 1558

T H E H I S T O RY O F T H E A R A L S E A

(Interactive map from wikimedia.org)

2DrY Tears

Page 3: News letter 09.2009

• As more water has been taken from the rivers, the sea's water level hasdecreased by over 60%.

• Drinking water supplies have dwindled, and the water is contaminatedwith pesticides and other agricultural chemicals as well as bacteria andviruses.

• The farms in the area use some highly toxic pesticides and other harm-ful chemicals. For decades, these chemicals have been deposited intothe Aral Sea. When the wind blows across the dried-up sea, it carriesdust containing these toxic chemicals.

• Lakes and seas tend to have a moderating effect on the climate. Inother words, the land right next to a body of water tends to be warmerin the winter and cooler in the summer than land that's not near thewater. As the Aral Sea has lost water, the climate has become moreextreme.

So a centuries old way of life has disappeared in decades. The vast areaof exposed seabed is laced with pesticides, so when the wind blows, duststorms spread salt and toxic substances over hundreds, if not thousandsof kilometres. It's estimated that 75 million tons of toxic dust and saltsare spread across Central Asia each year. If the Aral Sea dries up comple-tely, 15 billion tons of salt will be left behind.

Muynak is 210 km (130 mi) north of Nukus. Tourists can take a taxi or abus to reach Muynak from Nukus. There are options for private accom-modations in Muynak where you can stay overnight.

3 DrY Tears

Page 4: News letter 09.2009

O N T H E B E D O F T H E A R A L S E AP a r t O N ELake Sudoche (Sudovchin) is the largest body of water in the AmuDarya delta. When the river was running high, two of its branches, theRaushan and the Priemuzyak, used to flow into the Sudoche, whichwas connected by a channel to the Aral Sea. Now the Sea has recededby approximately 150 km, water levels in Lake Sudoche have fallen andit has split into a number of smaller lakes. The plateau rising in thebackground is the Ustyurt. The shore area is covered by small shrubsand salt, and the soil displays a striking variety of texture and colour.

Splendid isolationSaxaul is a plant somewherebetween a shrub and a smalltree which grows in the desertand on Asiatic steppes. Itsroot system seeks moisture toa depth of up to 30m, andsome varieties can withstandhigh levels of soil salinity. Inthe Large Aral, salt content isnow close to 100 g/litre (ima-

gine a packet of salt dissolved in a bucket) and even higher in the smal-ler, eastern part. In terms of salinity, the Aral Sea is currently second onlyto the Dead Sea, the saltiest water body on the planet. However, LakeSudoche used to be a freshwater lake in the spring and became salty onlyin the autumn. As far as I understood, it is now salty all year round. Thewhite deposits on the ground are not snow, but salt.

The deepThe weather was cold andmurky. Expedit ions to theUstyurt are few and far bet-ween at the best of times, andeven rarer at the end ofNovember. It is quite possiblethat these pictures are amongthe very few photographs ofLake Sudoche to be taken atthis time of the year.

In place of algaeThe main reason for the demi-se of the Aral is thought to bethe reck less exploitat ion ofthe water that flowed into itfrom the Amu Darya and SyrDarya rivers and the excessiveamounts of water diverted forcotton irrigation. However,many specialists are inclined

to believe that such rapid shrinkage cannot be blamed on human activi-ty alone, especially as there are serious geological and archaeologicalindications that the Aral may have undergone a similar process in thepast. The most likely explanation is that a combination of anthropoge-nic and natural factors were involved (decreased precipitation andincreased evaporation due to global warming). In addition, there aretheories about movements in the Earth's crust, and water flowing fromthe Aral to the Caspian, which is attributed to tectonic processes or tosecret bacteriological research conducted by the Soviet military onVozrozhdeniye (Resurrection) Island after 1949. The real reasons why theAral has dried up are not precisely clear.

When I was travelling across the Aral seabed to the former island ofBarsekelmes in 2005, a lady from the Barsekelmes reserve who wasaccompanying our expedition told us that an ancient settlement hadbeen found on the seabed, almost halfway between the island and theold shoreline. It was a fairly large settlement, with the remains of stonebuildings, and ditches and earthen ramparts around them … Althoughwe desperately wanted to visit the place, they refused to give us the exactcoordinates - it was too valuable a find for archaeologists and resear-chers. At that time the very fact that the site had been found was secret.Now some information about this "Atlantis of the Aral " is beginning toemerge. It is direct proof that the Aral was subject to massive, long-termshrinkage in the past.

The 16th relayThere is something veryappealing about the naturalbeauty of this harsh landsca-pe. Despite the fact that youcan go for weeks on theUstyurt without meet ing aliving soul, we did not have touse our tents once. We wereanxious not to, because theweather turned out to be -0-

10°C instead of the expected +0+ 5°C. The relays (radio relay stations)are positioned at 50 km intervals and were previously used to transmitbroadcast signals to outlying villages. With the development of satellitetelevision and the disappearance of settlements from the Ustyurt, thesewonders of modern technology have long since become redundant.Nearly all of them are uninhabited, with the exception of a few whichhave been converted for special purposes - usually for guarding a gaspipeline. Coming from Nukus, the closest relay station on the UstyurtPlateau is number 16; it was here that a guard gave us shelter on the firstnight of our expedition. On the following days we got nearly as far as the21st relay station (the only other inhabited station turned out to be the19th, although we did not spend any more nights at relay stations). All inall our jeeps covered about 1000 km on the Ustyurt in four days.

4DrY Tears

Page 5: News letter 09.2009

P a r t T W O P a r t T H R E EThe origin of the word Sudoche is curious. Despite the obvious asso-ciation, the name of the lake has nothing to do with the fish called"sudak" (pike perch). As our expedition leader told me, in Uzbek thelake is called "Suvdochin" from the word for water (suv) and the wordfor sincere (chin).

Along the road with cloudsAll the points along our routeare linked with sunrise andsunset. We had to get up atfive o'clock in the morning ifwe wanted to get to the shorein time for sunrise. And thenit would take us nearly anhour to find our way downfrom the "chink " and get tothe photography sites we had

marked out the evening before.

Chink (literary form; Kazakh. and Turkm. chin), a precipice or ledge on the edge ofa plateau or small residual butte. Term widespread in Kazakhstan, Turkmenistanand Uzbekistan. Most frequently used to describe cliffs on the Ustyurt Plateau.A chink can reach 300 to 350m in height. It is caused by erosion, denudation ortectonic deformation.

Layer cakeLake Sudoche used to be thelargest water body in thedelta, with a surface area of350 sq. km. and a depth of upto 3 m. Nowadays the lake isso shallow that you could pro-bably wade across it on foot.

No fish hereIn the 1950s the fishing villageof Urga, on the shores of LakeSudoche , was home to acouple of hundred people .Our guide, October, told usthat he used to have his cluband his post office here. Thelast inhabitant left in 1971.Nowadays hardly anythingremains.

The south-western region of the Aral Sea, the salt flat Borsa Kelmas.In Uzbek it means "he who goes does not return". The edge of theshore is really marshy, but the surface itself is stable and hard. Themain thing is to force a way through. And then return.

A salty supperWe got back - up to our kneesin dirt, exhausted but happy.We fooled around in thebright sunshine for a goodhalf hour, now and then tas-ting the salt. A genre photo.

Good morning sunshineBadwater Uzbek style

There is still a factory on thelake - perhaps for salt, per-haps for soda. The factory isclearly very secret, becausethere is not even anythingabout it on Google. The GPScoordinates are given below,but there is no factory on themap.

http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=43.3808,58.0025&spn=0.02,0.02&t=k

And yet the map is completely up to date, and gives a pretty accurate pic-ture of the Aral Sea within its current shores.

On the edge of the worldA panorama collage, 200x134degrees, 17 frames. The pro-portions are roughly correct,but they look unbelievable.The angle is too large + dis-tortion from the wide-anglelens. I have been told offabout the geometry, but Ican't help myself - I like thisphotograph, precisely becau-se it is so weird.

5 DrY Tears

Page 6: News letter 09.2009

This is Chimbergen, our dri-ver. The second driver wasca l led Bakbergen. Theending of both names means" he who has given " .Bakbergen - " he who hasgiven wi l l provide " , i .e . hewho gave this child (God) willprovide . And Chimbergenmeans " he who has truly

given " (remember Sudovchin, "suv" means water and "chin " meanstruth).

Our guide was called October, after the revolution. A good man too - ahistorian and archaeologist. I am starting to sound like the narrator ofmy favourite film, "Abdullahjan " (a Russian sci-fi comedy of the early90s): "This is the head of our kolchoz, a good man " . Thanks, guys!

The most banal thing you can say when you are on the eastern chinkof the Ustyurt Plateau is "this used to be the bed of the Aral Sea". Imyself used to imagine the seabed everywhere, even in places whereit never was. The phrase runs through the comments on our videonotes. And yet when it comes to the real seabed, which really used tobe at the bottom of that sea, words fail me.

Uzbek canyons

The three blackdots in the bottomright-hand part of the frame are cows. Our guides told us that this wasnot the first time they had seen them, they had obviously strayed fromthe herd. It is not at all clear how they manage to survive - after all thereare no people, no water and no food in these parts.

You can see the scale from the tracks ofthe jeeps in the background - this usedto be under water, and now you can driveacross it by car.

Until 1961, when the AralSea began to dry up, itswater level stood at the53.40 m. mark, and annual variations were never more than + /- 0.4 m.By 2003 the level had dropped to the 30.90 m. mark, i.e. by more than22 m. Moreover, the water level fell 1.26 m in 2002 and 1.14 m in 2001.These are the most recent data, which can be found on the Internet.Extrapolating from these figures, the Aral has probably fallen by atleast by another 5 m. by now, and the total drop in water level is like-ly to be in the region of 27 to 30 m. It is not difficult to imagine thisfigure, it is roughly equal to the height of a 9-nine storey block of flats.

Although the cliff in the photograph is high, it is clearly less than two sto-reys. In the upper right-hand corner we can see the sea. The differentialbetween the current shore and the bottom of the cliff is not significant,

since both points are on the flat surfaceof the former seabed. This means thatthe place where I took the photographused to be under water too.

And here is the far cliff, foreshorteneddifferently and with a large zoom ratio.

At the shoreline, the water is foaminglike in a wash basin, and white flakes areflying along the bank. The sea is veryshallow here, as can be seen from thewaves. I went in 30 m, but the wateronly came up to my ankles. The bottomis unpleasantly slimy and squelches likea bog. It was pretty cold, about 0° pluschill factor, but you understand why Icouldn't not go for a swim; my healthdid not suffer, thank God.

And this is what the last 100-200 m. ofroad looked l ike before it came up

P a r t F O U R P a r t F I V E

6DrY Tears

Page 7: News letter 09.2009

against a rocky precipice. The same precipice from where you get theview of the sea and where the first of this series of photographs was taken.

Loy takir

In Turk ic languages " loy "means clay and " takir" meanssmooth or level. There, that'swhat you get when you go del-ving in dictionaries. The takiris a type of relief in sandy, clayand stony deserts and semi-deserts in tropical and subtro-pical zones. The surface is ahard crust of clay and salt,

broken by polygonal fissures. In the spring takirs are usually submergedby water, turning into temporary lakes. Takirs can be found in Central

Asia, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, the MiddleEast, North America and Australia.

Hard to believe, but some 40 to 50 yearsago this really was the seabed.

I realise that everyone is fed up with photographs of the Aral Sea. I amtired of them myself, but if I do not finish off the material now, it islikely to hang around on my desk for an awful long time. And anyway,how can you photograph the Aral without the ships of the desert?Although we dragged ourselves down to the old jetty at the crack ofdawn, there was no dawn to be seen. Ghastly weather, literally a "greymist". As a result the photos you see are just for the record, but I deci-ded that the series would not be complete without them.

Until the 1960s the town of Muynak was a port on the island of the samename, and could only be reached by boat or plane. They say that whenthe sea first started to shrink, the water suddenly retreated 20 m. in onenight. The following morning, people ran after the sea and wept. Aftera while they tried to dig a channel from the port to the shore, but thewater retreated faster than they could dig. Nowadays this place is morethan 100 km from the sea. What the current inhabitants do remained amystery to me, but it was here that I saw the full tragedy of the Aral. Onthe Ustyurt, far from civilisation, what is happening seems more like anatural process. But where that process has destroyed an establishedway of life, and ruined people's lives - then the tragedy is real.

On the bed of the Aral Sea. Route and team

There wi l l probably be a ful lreport on our photo expedition to the Aral Sea later on. But in the mean-time I would like to say little bit about our team, our route and the jour-ney itself. This note draws a line, so to speak, under my six previousseries of photos with commentaries.

I loved the idea of going to Uzbekistan at once. As always, everythinghappened spontaneously and very quickly. A classic beginning - there Iwas, sitting at home, not planning to go anywhere. But then I cameacross the plan of the route which Jahangir aka had worked out on" Friends Lent " and I was immediately hooked. I spent a few days tryingto work out how I could get away, and then a day after that I already hadthe " Uzbek airlines " tickets in my pocket.

P a r t S I X

7 DrY Tears

Page 8: News letter 09.2009

The following day Jahangir came up with some unexpected news. Therehad been a telephone call from the Uzbek Civil Defence Ministry - just atthe time when we were planning to roam the Ustyurt plateau, they wereexpecting some sort of spacecraft to fall to land. The expedition quicklyhad to be switched to the week before. Because a week later we wouldsimply have frozen to death. With all the members of the expeditioncompletely booked up, it is a wonder that the journey was not called offthen.

The aim of the expedition was quite simple: to look and to take photo-graphs. We were chiefly interested in the Aral Sea region, which is stilllittle known. Despite the unusual processes which are occurring on theUstyurt, human beings are rarely seen there. However many scientistsand researchers may have visited, information is still scarce. We weredrawn like a magnet by the beauty of this arid country; this unique 20th-century phenomenon gave us no peace. We wanted to see the Sea whichno longer exists. And, clearly the height of madness, to see it in winter,at a time of the year when no normal person would dream of going there.

The Aral can still be seen from space. Judging from our GPS markers,Google maps give a fairly accurate reflection of the general picture andthe current extent of the sea.

The final route does not look the same as we planned, because realityintervened and necessitated a few corrections. First of all it was verycold. We had been had been counting on 0+10°, but the weather weencountered reversed the sign: 0-10°. Not to mention the wind - the windis a permanent resident on the Ustyurt and never leaves. However, fatelooked kindly on us, and we never had to spend a night under canvas.

We flew into Nukus on 23 November 2007. Our first night we spent in ahotel à la half a star, as a sort of decompression stop. Our second warmnight came courtesy of the guard at the 16th relay station. The third wespent in a hostel for workers at the salt factory on Lake Borsa Kelmas,which is home to about 10 to 15 people. What sort of factory it was andhow it got there, we never found out. The fourth night we spent inMuynak with relatives of our guide. And on the evening of the 27th wewere already in the ancient town of Khiva, but that is another story.

And here is our team.

From left to right: back row - Chimbergen,Jahangir, Vadim,Khurshid, October;front row - Pavel (me),Bakbergen

Chimbergen and BakbergenThe best, the fairest and most fearless drivers of UAZ and Gelentwagensin the world. The ending of both names means " he who has given " .Bakbergen - " he who has given will provide " , i.e. he who gave this child(God) will provide. And Chimbergen means " he who has truly given " .

October DospanovI have heard some exotic names, like Vilen (V.I.Lenin), Dazdraperma(Hail to the first of May) and Avantgarde, etc. But this was the first timeI had met a real October, named after the revolution. He was an acade-mic, amongst other things an archaeologist and historian. A great guy,and also our guide. He knows so many interesting things you could lis-ten to him for hours.

Khurshid JuraevAn economist and banking specialist, able to chat on his mobile phoneeven when there is no connection. Generally a friend and comrade,apprentice photographer and irreplaceable video operator. In Uzbek hisname means "cheerful " , which is completely appropriate to its owner'scharacter.

Vadim OnishchenkoA great nature photographer and winner of the " Golden Turtle " award. Amaster of international dispute from Israel. The meaning of this name isa matter of dispute. Some researchers think it is Persian, but the majo-rity incline to the view that it comes from the old Russian word "vaditi " ,meaning " discord, dispute " . Hard but fair.

JahangirWe got to know each other on a photo site - a long time ago. One dayZhenya (Jahangir) came to Moscow and called me up. Our meeting,need I say, ended at my place, with the drinking of much dry red wine.And a month later we were already sitting at table in his house in the sub-urbs of Tashkent. The place is called " Jannatmakon " , which means "val-ley of paradise " .

8DrY Tears

Page 9: News letter 09.2009

Is it time for me to become a translator? I remember I could even unders-tand what the Uzbeks were talking about as we were driving across theUstyurt in our jeeps. " Blah blah blah. Car. Blah blah blah. Route. Blahblah blah " ." Oh, Pavel, sorry, we were talking in Uzbek. "" No problem. I understand anyway. ""You understand? "" Sure, I understand. You were talking about cars. "

Then there is Jahangir. A name to conjure with, you have to admit. InFarsi " Jahan " means world and " gir" means to conquer; in Turkish" Jahan " means world and " gir" means to circle. And that is spot on,because our Zhenya/Jahangir has been halfway round the world and hasalready been to 38 countries. The devil!

In actual fact, the idea of a photo expedition to the Aral was Jahangir's.It was he who organised everything, he invited us all and became our lea-der. Thanks, buddy!

Pavel Kosenko

A few photographs for the album.After all, it was a photo expedition.

Remember - this is salt, not snow. LakeBorsa Kelmas means " he who goes willnot return " .

The three dots at the bottom are me,Vadim and Jahangir.

As I said, I couldn't not bathe in the Aral.I would never have forgiven myself. Youhad to put up with extremes, after all itwas 0° and windy.

And now, for the sake of completeness,we obviously need some sort of a story.Something like: our jeeps broke down and we got stuck in a quicksandand if it had not been for our satellite phones, we would certainly havedied. But nothing like that happened. And what is more, we dependedon each other and left our satellite phones at home.

Well, there was one story. It goes like this. We woke up in Muynak at thecrack of dawn. Every day we woke up long before dawn, because we wereon a photo expedition. That means that the most interesting things hap-pen when the sun is rising or setting. And so everyone was getting intothe jeeps, but Chimbergen was nowhere to be found. We started lookingfor him. Jahangir went running round the yard shouting: "We are goingto miss the sunrise, you good-for-nothing son-of-a-bitch!" . Suddenly theowner of the house appeared from behind a corner and came up to meand said: " Have you got a torch? " . I gave him my torch, the sort you strapon to your forehead with a rubber band. The owner disappeared into thedarkness. And then five minute minutes later Chimbergen emergedtriumphantly from the loo. Quite pleased with himself, grinning fromear to ear. The torch on his forehead and a long wooden stick in hishand. At the end of the stick a lump of shit with a mobile phone insideit. But how did he fish it out? We were in time for the sunrise after all,although this time it was a bit messy.And in the evening of that day we were already resting our aching limbsin a three star hotel in the ancient city of Khiva. But that is another story,the second part of our journey.

The chronology of the Aral can be found on www.kungrad.com.

9 DrY Tears

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In the 1960s, the Soviet Union under-took a major water diversion project onthe arid pla ins of Kazakhstan,Uzbek istan, and Turkmenistan. Theregion’s two major rivers, fed fromsnowmelt and precipitation in far-awaymountains, were used to transform thedesert into fields for cotton and othercrops. Before the project, the two riversleft the mounta ins, cut northwestthrough the Kyzylkum Desert—the

Syrdar’ya to the north and the Amudar’ya in parallel to the south—andfinally pooled together in the lowest part of the desert basin. The lakethey made, the Aral Sea, was once the fourth largest lake in the world.

Although irrigation made the desert bloom, it devastated the Aral Sea.This series of images from the Moderate Resolut ion ImagingSpectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Terra satellite documents thechanges in the the Aral Sea throughout the past decade. At the start ofthe series in 2000, the lake was already a fraction of its 1960 extent(black line). The Northern Aral Sea (sometimes called the Small AralSea) had separated from the Southern (Large) Aral Sea. The SouthernAral Sea had split into an eastern and a western lobe that remainedtenuously connected at both ends.

By 2001, the southern connection had been severed, and the shallowereastern part retreated rapidly over the next several years. Especiallylarge retreats in the eastern lobe of the Southern Sea appear to haveoccurred between 2005 and 2006, and again between 2007 and 2008.The final image in the series is from the spring of 2009. Blowing dust(salt-laden sediments) covers a large part of the sea.

As the lake dried up, fisheries and the communities that depended onthem collapsed. The increasingly salty water became polluted with fer-tilizer and pesticides. The blowing dust from the exposed lakebed,contaminated with agricultural chemicals, became a public healthhazard. The salty dust blew off the lakebed and settled onto fields,degrading the soil. Croplands had to be flushed with larger and largervolumes of river water. The loss of the moderating influence of such alarge body of water made winters colder and summers hotter and drier.In a last-ditch effort to save some of the lake, Kazakhstan built a dambetween the northern and southern parts of the Aral Sea. Completed in2005, the dam was basically a death sentence for the southern Aral Sea,which was judged to be beyond saving. All of the water flowing into thedesert basin from the Syrdar’ya now stays in the Northern Aral Sea.Between 2005 and 2006, the water levels in that part of the lakerebounded significantly and very small increases are visible throughoutthe rest of the time period. The differences in water color are due tochanges in sediment.

Distinctive lines of cloudsstretch out from the shoreof the Aral Sea in this photo-like image captured by theModerate Resolut ionImaging Spectroradiometeron NASA’s Aqua satellite onMarch 12, 2009. While waveclouds like this are not unu-sual, this particular patternover the Aral Sea is highly

unusual. The clouds conform exactly to the shape of the western shore.

Wave clouds typically form when a mountain, island, or even anothermass of air forces an air mass to rise. The air cools as it rises, and ifthere is moisture in the air, the water condenses into clouds. Once theair has gone over the obstacle, it sinks again. The air warms as it drops,and the cloud dissipates. Like ripples on a pond, the wave motioncontinues, and the air rises and drops again and again until eventuallythe wave dissipates. The result is a line of clouds marking the crests ofthe wave, separated by clear areas in the troughs of the wave.

In this case, the western shore of the Aral Sea clearly created the distur-bance needed to generate the initial wave motion. But what was the dis-turbance? There are several possibilities. First, the waves could be causedby a change in wind speed as the air moved eastward over the sea. Airmoves slowly over land, slowed by plants, changes in elevation, and otherrough features. When the air reached the sea, the surface it encounteredwas smooth, and the air near the surface would have moved faster. The airabove it, however, would have continued to move at the previous pace.Imagine a jogger who unexpectedly steps on a patch of ice: his feet moveforward faster than his head, and he falls back as his legs slip forwardunder him. The air experiences much the same motion. The lower layer ofair (in contact with the smooth surface of the water) moves more quicklythan the air above it, pushing the lower layer of air up. This motion couldhave created the wave that generated these clouds.

Another possibility is that the shoreline is elevated above the water. TheAral Sea has been steadily shrinking. What remains is the deepest por-tions of the sea. It is possible that the western shore is distinctly defi-ned, and that there is a drop to the surface of the water. This change inelevation would cause the surface air to drop suddenly, which couldalso initiate wave motion. Both factors, the air speed and the shoreline,may in fact be working together to influence the shape of the clouds.Regardless of how they formed, the result is a beautiful fan of whiteover the emerald water of the Aral Sea.

NASA images courtesy Jeff Schmaltz, at NASA GSFC. Caption by HolliRiebeek. Thanks to Gala Wind and Tom Arnold for image interpretation.

E VA P O R A T I O NO F T H E A R A L S E A

U N U S U A L W A V EC LO U D S O V E RT H E A R A L S E A

11 DrY Tears

Page 12: News letter 09.2009

Le chemin serpentait entre les dunes du désert. Sur des kilomètres,pas une âme, les oiseaux, même, ne volent pas jusqu'ici.« Espérance », l’indicatif d’appel de notre voiture, premier contact : lavoix du chef de notre expédition, Dmitri Voyakin, collaborateur scien-tifique à l’Institut d’Archéologie Marguilan, retentie à la radio, il portenotre attention sur le fait que nous roulions depuis déjà 10 minutes surle fond de la mer d’Aral.Chacune des journées de cette expédition commencera de la mêmemanière : les archéologues accompagnés de notre reporteur seront enavant poste.

Trésors au fond de la mer

Il y a plusieurs décennies, l’eau s’ébrouait ici, des poissons nageaient etdes navires circulaient.Maintenant, c'est un immense espace sans vie, couvert de sables salés etde coquillages cachant de nombreuses «belles découvertes. "

En 2001, les chasseurs du village Karateren sont tombés accidentellement surune inhumation antique à proximité des îles de la mer, autrefois appeléesBarsakelmes. Les archéologues sont intéressés par cette découverte étrange.À la suite de l'expédition, des scientifiques de l'Institut d'Archéologied'Almaty, A. Marguilan et des étudiants de l’Université nationale Korkit-ata deKyzylordine, ont ouvert un mausolée (qu'ils ont appelé Kerderi), autourduquel se trouvent de nombreuses tombes. Les parcours des expéditionssuivantes sont devenus assez sensationnelles, à 25 kilomètres du mausoléeKerderi on a trouvé un autre mausolée et l'ancienne colonie.

Sur le territoire de la colonie de 6hectares, nous avons trouvé 15 grossesmeules, des morceaux de poteries et desmonnaies en argent, des ornements enfer rouillés, ainsi que des fragments defours, qui produisaient des briques, -raconte Dmitry Voyakin. - On a égale-ment trouvé un réseau d'irrigat ionantique. À ce jour, il est resté le canal

principal et les canaux de sortie. L’analyse des sols a montré que les gens quivivaient ici, cultivaient le riz. Le grand nombre de meules montre que le rendementdu sol était productif.

Les fouilles du mausolée ont également apporté beaucoup de découvertes. Dans lehall central on a retrouvé des cercueils de bois, mais le plus intéressant, c'est que lesinhumations ont été effectuées selon le rite musulman, aucun mobilier funéraire n’aété retrouvé sur place. Seule, une tombes était remplie de boucles d'oreille en or.Mais une sensationnelle découverte attendait les archéologues au dernier jour del'expédition.

Les travaux étaient pratiquement finis,quand j'ai décidé de faire une dernièrefouille des briques empilées autour dumausolée, - déclare Dmitri. - nous com-mencions juste à creuser quand noussommes tombés sur un mur, parfaite-

ment conservé, du portail. Comme il s'est avéré, la mer avait rongé le mausolée detous les côtés, et le mur du portail s'est effondré entièrement. Les briques sonttombées du haut, couvert de sable, l'eau les a emportées, ce qui a jusqu'à présent par-faitement préservé la glaçure de l’artefact (vitrage), dont l'analyse révèle de nom-breux secrets des colonies de peuplement dans le fond de la mer d'Aral.

Tu iras – tu ne reviens pas

Car la colonie a été retrouvé près dela célèbre île de Barsakelmes (enkazakh il signifie «tu iras – tu nereviens pas»), une décision a étéprise de maintenir un peu d'explo-ration sur l'île même, à la recherchedes objets de sites archéologiques,

sur ce point fatidique, composé de nombreuses légendes et d’histoires quidécrivent les incidents bizarres et obscurs impliquant un changement dansle cours normal du temps physique. Ils disent qu’un jour quelques person-nes se sont éloignées de la côte en marchant pendant une demi-heure dansle « brouillard blanc », quand ils sont revenus, ils ont été surpris d'appren-dre qu'ils se sont absentés … un jour. Et encore mieux, certain habitants ducoin, sont persuadé qu'il existe … une base secrète d'OVNI.

En 1939, l'île est devenue un sanctuaire sur le territoire duquel se sontrassemblé des oiseaux, des animaux rares et des gens.

L'eau a disparue - et la vie aussi …

Nous avions espéré trouver sur l'île, les vestiges d'un village néolithique (âge depierre), - dit Dmitry Voyakin. Sur les photographies aériennes, il existe mani-festement plusieurs collines, ce qui pourrait être des tumulus. L'exploration initialea montré que cette région devrait être étudiée plus en détail. Nous espérons décou-vrir encore quelques villes.

De l'île Barsakelmes nous sommes revenus sains et saufs. Cependant, la sensationde quelque chose d'irréel n’a jamais quitté notre équipe pendant tout le temps quenous sommes restés là-bas. Barsakelmes c’est un endroit véritablement mystique.Comme, cependant, la région entière de la mer d'Aral. Les trouvailles au fond de lamer, donnent lieu à de nouveaux débats sur l'écologie du territoire de la mer d'Aral.Il s'avère que les catastrophes écologiques influencent la région depuis l'antiquité.La colonie retrouvée est un témoignage. La ville a été construite au moment del'assèchement de la mer, puis l'eau a tout avalé. Les archéologues sont convaincusque le fond d'Aral cache encore beaucoup de mystères.

A RA L ATLA N TIS

12DrY Tears

Page 13: News letter 09.2009

A l'aube du matin du mois de septembre, les quatre voitures chargéscomme des chameaux et excités par les hommes scientifiques, se sontlancés dans la direction de la région de Qyzylorda. Un groupe d'archéo-logues à la recherche de nouveaux sites archéologiques s’est lancédans une expédition passionnante sur les chemins de la Grande Routede la Soie. Les scientifiques se sont concentrés sur les trois objectifs :trouver et identifier la Cité perdue des Rois, Djouvara, afin de contin-uer des fouilles d’un grand site d'Aral-Asar, qui a été retrouvée au fondde la mer d'Aral dans la dernière année, et de faire des insulaires desarchéologue de l’île de Barsac-Kelm_s. En général, le voyage prometd'être intéressant. Après plusieurs jours de voyages, nous sommesarrivés à notre premier but.

Trésors au fond de la mer

Djouvara – est l'une des plus mystérieuse des anciennes villes du Kazakhstan,affirme le chercheur Dmitri Voyak in de l'Institut d'Archéologie A.Margulan, ses secrets inquiètes les esprits des nombreux scientifiques. Lesrecherches archéologiques globales actuelles, je pense, seront le début d'un grandtravail sur, les soi-disant, colonies de marécages.

En creusant plusieurs fosses, un grouped’archéologues a commencé à examinerla situation stratigraphique de la ville,l'autre s’est préparé pour la collecte dematériels de levage de surface deDjouvara. Moi aussi, j'ai voulu essayerd’être une archéologue. J’ai posé monregard sur les pieds et me suis lancée à larecherche des trésors. Je voudrais vous

dire que c'est une occupation passionnante! On oublie le temps passés et le cheminparcouru. Tout à coup, un petit objet vert a attiré mon attention. C’était incroyable! Une vraie bague. Un peu à l'écart, j'ai remarqué quelque chose d'autre. Et voilà,je tiens dans mes mains un bracelet de femme. N’étant pas encore revenue d'unetelle chance, je suis tombée sur un trésor de pièces de monnaie.

Bravo, tu es une véritable archéologue! – m’encourage l’académicien CarlBaipakov. – Il faut que vous restez ici jusqu'à la fin de l'expédition (Il riait).

En tenant dans les mains une autre découverte, j'ai pensé : “Je me demandecomment ils étaient, les habitants de Djouvara? A quoi ils pensaient ou rêvaient?Quoi ou qui les a obligés à quitter cette ville florissante?”. Selon les donnéespréliminaires, les premières constructions ont paru ici au début de notreère. Au début de X siècle Djouvara atteint son apogée. Et après quelquescentaines d’années ou un peu plus, la ville des Rois est tombée en déca-dence.

Dmitri Alexéevitch, regardez ce que j'ai trouvé – s’est exclamé un participantde l'expédition, Alik Orazaliev, en tenant dans la main un objet étrange.

C’était l’image d'un homme nu! Excellent, il s'agit du deuxième exemple retrouvé!– a exclamé avec enthousiasme Dmitri Voyakin. - L'année dernière, nousavons trouvé ici le premier artefact. Ces plaques sont cousues sur des habits desfilles à partir de leur maturité sexuelle - m'explique t'il.

Je pense sans aucun doute, que nousnous sommes approchés des secrets per-dus de l'histoire de la Ville des Rois ouSun City - a conclu l’académicienBaipakov. A premiére vue, d'après sataille, son système complexe de fortifi-cation et de la composition intérieur, çadevait être une ville très importante,

elle est très impressionnante. Les « Cités lacustres » sont les monuments his-toriques et culturels des Turcs anciens et le plus mal étudié à ce jour. Et, bien sûr, leplus grand intérêt parmi eux c'est, exactement, Djouvara.

Pendant deux jours, les archéologues avaient ramenés de la surface decette grande ville environ cinq kilogrammes d'objets en bronze et enargent : pièces, boucles de ceinture, bijoux, plaques. En outre, a étéretrouvé de nombreux fragments de céramique, et sur le lieu desrecherches, les scientifiques peuvent observer l’architecture.

Fantastique! Telle quantité d'objets trouvés, nous n'en n'avons pas eu autant desautres anciennes villes (partage son opinion un membre de l'expédition,Arman Umarhodzhiev). On ne peut que deviner ce qui se cache derrièreses secrets et quels trésors sont encore cachés sous la terre.

Si tout va bien, des fouilles sur le site peuvent être recommencées àgrande échelle l'année suivante. Et Sun City Djouvara vous fera découvrirune nouvelle page dans le passé historique du Kazakhstan.

Nadejda Plyaskina, Région de Qyzylorda - Almaty

C ITY « S O LEIL »

13 DrY Tears

Page 14: News letter 09.2009

De plus en plus souvent, de violentes tempêtes de poussière balaientdes régions entières d’Asie centrale. Avec l’assèchement de la merd’Aral, le vent emporte davantage de sable avec du sel pollué et desproduits chimiques empoisonnés. Les tempêtes de poussière accen-tuent la pauvreté et répandent des maladies.

Il y a 40 ans seulement se trouvait ici une mer. C’est à présent l’un deslieux les plus secs du Kazakhstan et de l’Asie centrale. C’est la raison dela présence de ces chercheurs européens.

“ Le lac d’Aral était une île de fraîcheur entre deux déserts, le Karakoum et leKusulkoum, explique Christian Opp, géophysicien de l’Université deMarburg, en Allemagne. Elle était un réservoir d’eau énorme, avec un habitatet un biotope très riches, munis d’une grande biodiversité. Maintenant, on appel-le l’ancien lac le “Aralkoum”, le désert d’Aral. On en voit des signes partout : le lacest devenu un autre désert.”

“ Le principal problème avec la baisse du niveau de la mer a été la disparition d’es-pèces de poissons de grande valeur, ajoute O leg Semedov, physicien àl’Institut de recherche kazakh de l‘écologie et du climat. Cela a conduitbeaucoup de pêcheurs et de personnes vivant sur la côte à perdre leurs emplois.Mais il y a eu un second problème. Ce qui était le fond de la mer est à présent undangereux mélange de poussière, de sels, d’aérosols et de produits chimiques quis’envolent avec le vent. Leur propagation a détérioré la végétation à 150 km alen-tour. C’est ainsi que la désertification de toute la région a commencé.”

Voilà comme se présentait la mer d’Aral en 1960. L’utilisation massive etimpropre de ses affluents pour l’irrigation l’a réduit à trois plus petitslacs. La mer a perdu quelque 50 000 km2. L’impact social et humain de cephénomène est terrible.

Le chômage et la pauvreté sont criants le long des anciens rivages. Desmaladies comme la tuberculose ou l’hépatite sont ici deux fois plusrépandues que dans les régions alentour. Et puis, il y a le vent.

Fréquemment, des tempêtes de poussière traversent l’ancien fondmarin, emportant au loin du sable, du sel et des produits chimiques uti-lisés pour l’agriculture. Un cocktail empoisonné que respirent chaquejour les habitants.

Ce sombre phénomène est à présent examiné à la loupe par une équipede chercheurs européens au sein du projet “Calter” .

“ D’abord, nous voulons comprendre ce qui se passe avec les tempêtes de poussiè-re ici en Asie centrale et particulièrement autour de la mer d’Aral, parce que lesdernières études se sont arrêtées après l’effondrement de l’URSS, explique LeahOrlovsky, coordinatrice du projet Calter. La poussière ne connaît pas les fron-tières politiques, elle peut virtuellement se déplacer vers l’Europe ou d’autresrégions du monde. Nous voulons savoir quelle quantité de poussière et de sel s’en-vole, leur composition, leur direction. Ensuite, nous voulons proposer des solutions

pour atténuer les conséquences de ces tempêtes de poussière.”

A 300 km de la mer d’Aral, les chercheurs se rendent dans cette stationmétéorologique pour installer des pièges à poussière.

Les particules capturées pendant les tempêtes de poussière sont ensui-te pesées, mesurées et analysées. Les scientifiques estiment que les tem-pêtes peuvent transporter jusqu‘à 400 kg de poussière par hectarechaque mois dans des endroits comme celui-ci.

“ Nous avons déterminé les tailles de grains de poussière et aussi leur compositionminérale à l’aide de techniques comme la radiofluorescence, rapporte ChristianOpp. Avec ces informations, nous avons pu établir les régions de provenance.Nous avions une hypothèse : puisque ces poussières proviennent en partie du fonddu lac d’Aral, les taux de sel doivent être relativement élevés. Et nous en avons eula confirmation : le sel de la Mer d’Aral est bien arrivé jusqu’ici.”

La recherche des poussières se poursuit à 1 300 km de là, au sud-ouest.Nous voici à Almaty, l’ancienne capitale du Kazakhstan. Au Centre natio-nal de recherche spatiale, les tempêtes de poussière sont observées deprès, grâce à des satellites.

Ces tempêtes constituent un élément clé du changement climatique.Répandue dans l’atmosphère, la poussière rafraîchirait la surface desocéans et empêcherait le déclenchement d’ouragans notamment.

Les images satellites montrent qu’ici, en Asie centrale, les tempêtes depoussière contribuent à assécher des régions déjà très désertique.

“ Depuis l’an 2000, la poussière provient d’une superficie de la région d’Aral tou-jours plus grande; l’intensité et la fréquence des tempêtes de poussière augmen-tent également, témoigne Lev Spivak directeur du centre national de tech-nologie et de recherche spatial. Auparavant, les émissions se faisaient surtoutvers le nord-ouest. A présent, elles sont surtout dirigées vers le sud; cela signifieque chaque année, de nouvelles superficies de terres sont polluées par le sel dufond marin de l’Aral.”

Les chercheurs souha itent éga lement comprendre les dynamiquesinternes des tempêtes de poussière, leurs volumes, leur vitesse et leurdensité, la façon dont elles se forment et s‘éteignent.

Pour ce faire, ils reproduisent de petites tempêtes de poussière dans untunnel à vent artisanal, équipé de laser et remplis de poussière du désertet de sable.

“ Ces expériences nous ont permis de comprendre quelle quantité de sable s’envo-le avec le vent à différentes vitesses, selon O leg Semedov. Nous savons à pré-sent que les particules de sable avancent comme une avalanche ; les plus petitesparticules se soulèvent et entraînent de plus grosses particules qui en entraînentelles-mêmes de plus grosses etcetera. Nous savons aussi que la concentration

L E M Y S T È R E D E S T E M P Ê T E SD E P O U S S I È R E D E L A M E R D ’A R A L

14DrY Tears

Page 15: News letter 09.2009

maximum de sable s‘élève à quelques fractions de millimètre. Plus il se trouvehaut dans l’oeil de la tempête, plus la densité de poussière est faible. Des équa-tions mathématiques nous aident à calculer la masse totale de sable emporté àdifférentes hauteurs et dans différentes vitesses de vents.”

De retour au désert, les scientifiques étudient différents sites géolo-giques. Ils sont convaincus qu’autour de la Mer d’Aral, une désertifica-tion due à l’action de l’homme amplifie les tempêtes de poussière, etassèche les régions alentour. Un cycle infernal contre lequel existentquelques solutions préventives.

“ Nous savons à présent que la quantité réelle de poussière par unité de surfacemesurée en tonne par année et par hectare diminue, résume Leah Orlovsky.Nous connaissons la composition chimique de cette poussière ; nous savons aussid’où elle vient. Nous avons donc beaucoup de nouvelles données pour proposerquelques solutions préventives. Le meilleur moyen de préserver la région de la Merd’Aral de toute dégradation est de cultiver des plantes locales. Non pas dans toutl’ancien fond marin mais sur de petites îles vertes ; ces plantes retiendraient la sur-face et il y aurait beaucoup moins de poussière emportée.”

Les scientifiques espèrent aussi que leur travail aidera à mettre en placeun système d’alerte des risques écologiques en Asie centrale.

15 DrY Tears

Page 16: News letter 09.2009
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Page 18: News letter 09.2009
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Page 20: News letter 09.2009

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