Aral Sea went from the third largest lake in the world to a salt desert https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aral_Sea

This is completely human caused — the whole thing was drained by people for irrigation 

It has set up the largest primary succession experiment ever — watching to see if anything grows in the salt desert left behind https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-59560-8_5

The Farcaster formerly known as Kchamp. Books, beats, bodybuilding, bright ideas and beautiful things.

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They low key felt at the time using up all the water was more important than preserving it. Way more cavalier than we might be. It’s wild

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Me too. It doesn’t seem to be going that well in the short term to be honest. So much salt….

I understand the tourism. I want to see it. I am learning as well they are discovering archaeological remains down there which interestingly suggests that it wasn’t always a lake

I went to Moynaq, a town in Uzbekistan on the former southern shore,  about 12 years ago.  It was surreal to wander through the old fish cannery and look out over the sandy expanse from a monument marking the disappearance of the sea.

I've heard tourism is on the rise of late. Used to be a long bus ride from Nukus. Now there's even an airport.   

Curious to see how the experiment goes.

This seems like a great are for some synthetic biology to come in and make plants that thrive specifically in a salt desert