THE ARAL SEA UZBEKISTAN TO MOSCOW PART 1

The Aral Sea first began mysteriously disappearing in the 1960s, a slow process that continued for decades. In 2014 NASA presented a satellite image that showed for the first time in modern history the eastern basin of the Aral Sea had completely dried up… it's now known as the Aralkum Desert.

Today, the slowly rusting hulks of ships embedded in the sands of a 'new' desert serve as a reminder of the significant fishing, fish canning and maritime industries that once thrived here. The Aral Sea once provided a sixth of the Soviet Union's fish catch and was ringed with prosperous towns – home to 40,000 workers. There was even a secret Soviet weapons testing facility built on an island (of which there were once 1,100) in the Aral Sea between 1948 and 1954. Initially this facility was protected by a natural coastline