Desert wrecks: The desolate ship cemetery where camels walk beside rusting vessels buried in sand
By Emma Reynolds
MydeaMedia
These are the desert wrecks - great hulking ships scattered across a wide expanse of sand in Central Asia.
The rusting vessels once sailed proudly across the 26,000 sq mile Aral Sea between Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.
Now they lie in a vast, arid plain that provides no hint of the fact it was once a lake the size of Scotland.
Desolate plains: An abandoned ship lies on the sand in the arid desert near the Kazakh city of Aralsk, on what was once the Aral sea
Beached whale: A rusty vessel sinks into the scrubland near the village of Zhalanash in Kazakhstan
The dried-up stretch was once a popular spot for fishermen, but they have long since abandoned its shores, leaving their boats behind.
Now an incredible variety of majestic ships stand desolate in the baking sun, as camels wander languidly around their corroded hulls.
The lake has shrunk by 90 per cent in the past 50 years in what has been called one of the planet's 'most shocking environmental disasters.'
It began to disappear back in the 1960s, when Russia diverted the rivers that fed the lake to assist irrigation at their cotton plants.
Unlikely neighbours: Camels wander past the old wrecks at the 'Sheep cemetery' in Dzhambul settlement, 64km from Aralsk
The shrunken sea has ruined the once-robust fishing economy and left stranded trawlers sinking into the wastelands like permanent features of the landscape.
As the water evaporated, it left layers of highly salted sand, which winds can carry as far as Scandinavia and Japan.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged Central Asian leaders to step up efforts to solve the problem after touring the sea by helicopter last April.
Water world: The expansive Aral Sea as it used to be in 1973
Drained: The same spot in 2008, after dams and diversions for agriculture by competing countries divided it into three bodies of water
He described the scene in Nukus, capital of Karakalpak, as 'a graveyard of ships', adding: 'It is clearly one of the worst disasters, environmental disasters of the world. I was so shocked.'
Leaders in the area have been locked in disagreements over who has rights to scarce water and how it should be used.
Uzbek officials complained about dam projects in Tajikistan, after the impoverished coutnry decided the hydroelectric projects could be key revenue earners.
MydeaMedia @ 2012
The lake has shrunk by 90 per cent in the past 50 years in what has been called one of the planet's 'most shocking environmental disasters.'
It began to disappear back in the 1960s, when Russia diverted the rivers that fed the lake to assist irrigation at their cotton plants.
Unlikely neighbours: Camels wander past the old wrecks at the 'Sheep cemetery' in Dzhambul settlement, 64km from Aralsk
The shrunken sea has ruined the once-robust fishing economy and left stranded trawlers sinking into the wastelands like permanent features of the landscape.
As the water evaporated, it left layers of highly salted sand, which winds can carry as far as Scandinavia and Japan.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged Central Asian leaders to step up efforts to solve the problem after touring the sea by helicopter last April.
Water world: The expansive Aral Sea as it used to be in 1973
Drained: The same spot in 2008, after dams and diversions for agriculture by competing countries divided it into three bodies of water
He described the scene in Nukus, capital of Karakalpak, as 'a graveyard of ships', adding: 'It is clearly one of the worst disasters, environmental disasters of the world. I was so shocked.'
Leaders in the area have been locked in disagreements over who has rights to scarce water and how it should be used.
Uzbek officials complained about dam projects in Tajikistan, after the impoverished coutnry decided the hydroelectric projects could be key revenue earners.
MydeaMedia @ 2012
MydeaMedia @ 2012
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