Return of the Aral Sea

Kazakhstan & Uzbekistan · Tap photos for captions

The Aral Sea, straddling the border between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, was once the fourth-largest lake in the world. In the 1960s, Soviet planners diverted the rivers that fed it to irrigate cotton fields, and the sea began to vanish. Salinity rose, the fish died off, and fishing towns like Moynaq were left stranded in the desert, their ships rusting on the sand. But in Kazakhstan, a dam completed in 2005 has brought part of the sea back. Freshwater fish have returned to the North Aral, fish processing plants in Aralsk have reopened, and fishermen who thought they would never again see fish in the sea they grew up on have returned to their work.

Rusting ships sit in the desert in the former port in Moynaq, Uzbekistan, on March 14, 2018.

Omirserik Ibragimov, 25, uses a net to ice fish on the frozen surface of the Aral Sea near Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

Men use nets to ice fish on the frozen surface of the Aral Sea near Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 26, 2018.

Aldanbek Kerinov, 27, uses nets to ice fish on the frozen surface of the Aral Sea near Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

A man uses a pick to break through the ice on the frozen surface of the Aral Sea near Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 26, 2018.

Children play on a snowdrift in Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

Two men exchange a cigarette outside a home in Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

Omirserik Ibragimov, 25, works on a Russian 4 wheel drive vehicle in Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

Kiderbai Ibragimov, 45, prepares a meal in Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

Omirserik Ibragimov, 25, attempts to lead a camel to a shelter in Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

Kiderbai Ibragimov, 45, watches as his wife milks a camel in Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

A camel walks near Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

A Muslim graveyard is photographed at sunrise near Tastubek, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 25, 2018.

A rusty, abandoned truck sits on a street in Aralsk, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 27, 2018.

An ornamental lighthouse adorns a grave overlooking the Aral Sea on the outskirts of Aralsk, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 27, 2018.

Fish species native to the Aral Sea are displayed at a museum in Aralsk, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 27, 2018.

A bin of fish are weighed upon deliver to a fish processing facility in Aralsk, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 27, 2018.

A worker prepares fish to be smoked at a fish processing facility in Aralsk, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 27, 2018.

Kazakh men and women wait for a train under a Soviet mural in Aralsk, Kazakhstan, on Feb. 27, 2018.