[HN Gopher] The Aral Sea has shrunk because of the re-routing of...
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The Aral Sea has shrunk because of the re-routing of its source
rivers (2022)
Author : freediver
Score : 49 points
Date : 2023-01-07 19:04 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.marineinsight.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.marineinsight.com)
| vbezhenar wrote:
| It's not clear whether it was because of re-routing. It used to
| shrink in the past. Might just be some nature cycle.
| ryankshaw wrote:
| The same is going to happen to the (once) Great Salt Lake. It's
| going to be a disaster, the vast majority of the population of
| Utah lives along the Wasatch Front nextdoor and downwind from it,
| and all the heavy metals and toxic chemicals that are stably
| suspended in it from the Kennecott copper mine and the old Geneva
| Steel mills are going to turn into dust and go straight into
| their lungs. There's going to be a ton of cancer just like all
| the towns along the shores of the dried up Aral Sea
| madaxe_again wrote:
| I've been to a few of said towns - Aralsk is the most notable.
|
| It's a forsaken place. Never mind the port machinery swinging
| idly in the hot, dusty breeze, suspended over toxic sludge
| where a sea once lapped its shores - the human disaster there
| is palpable. There's no industry, no work, no future. People
| sit, and wait. The North Korean friendship centre hands out
| packages of household supplies on a dusty square full of dead
| trees. The place is half abandoned, and the people who remain -
| well, they're abandoned too.
|
| It's hard to describe the heaviness that sat over the place -
| it's oppressive, a feeling of inexorable doom.
|
| It's unlikely these places will exist in the not too distant
| future. They existed on the brink, and the brink is long gone,
| and they are in freefall.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| While as far as I can tell the Great Salt Lake's level is
| presently _severely_ low due to human actions, reconstructions
| of the historic level of the lake from tree ring analysis shows
| that the lake 's natural level fluctuates substantially even
| when humans aren't doing anything to it. So even if water
| diversions stopped, the GSL area would still have a long-term
| problem on their hands. The toxic lake bed will get exposed one
| way or the other, if not through the actions of men then
| through natural fluctuations. Given that the lakebed is already
| contaminated and there's no way to fix that, the best solution
| is to live someplace else.
|
| > _For example, the driest (wettest) year on record, 1581
| (1464) occurred many centuries ago and was substantially larger
| in magnitude than the historical record. At lower frequencies,
| the GSL lake-level reconstruction revealed large, multi-year
| reductions in lake levels from 1580-1600, in the 1630s, and
| from 1700-1710 that in each case were at least as severe as the
| known lake-level minima during the drought of the 1930s and
| 2000-2001 (Figure 3)._
|
| https://www.srs.fs.usda.gov/pubs/46447
|
| Incidentally, the "many centuries ago" framing is revealing of
| a general attitude I've noticed from Americans, particularly
| Americans living in the western half of the country. They think
| "several centuries" is essentially an eternity because in their
| region, several centuries ago is before recorded history. And
| in a sense, for an individual human planning their life,
| several centuries may as well be an eternity. But for _city_
| planning, an environmental problem that 's likely to be
| disastrous for the city every few hundred years should be
| considered a severe threat. That sort of circumstance makes for
| a city that won't survive the test of time.
|
| Another example of this sort of short-term thinking is water
| levels in California. According to tree stump analysis,
| California has been unusually wet since America acquired the
| land; this luck will not last. California had, and will have
| again, droughts which are far more severe than any Californian
| drought in living memory. Californian communities should be
| planning to deal with such severe droughts, but many
| Californians seem to prefer believing that they can somehow
| stabilize the Californian climate to always be the way it was
| when they were kids.
| ilammy wrote:
| > _Incidentally, the "many centuries ago" framing is
| revealing of a general attitude I've noticed from Americans_
|
| They don't say "in Europe 100 miles is a long way, in America
| 100 years is a long time" for nothing.
|
| 100 years ago WW1 just finished. 200 years ago saw a peak of
| slave imports into US. 300 years ago thirteen colonies just
| finished forming. 400 years ago colonization just started.
| 500 years ago Columbus' expeditions were still news.
|
| Not to say that nothing happened in Europe in the meantime
| lol, but this sets a perspective quite well. "100 years ago"
| _is_ effectively "eternity" for an individual human. Only
| societies can retain memories at that scale.
| nerdponx wrote:
| All of this is valid, but that doesn't mean humans aren't
| making it worse than it needs to be. "It fluctuates anyway"
| is a common talking point for those who want to deny the
| effect of human activity.
| LarryMullins wrote:
| As I said: the Great Salt Lake's level is presently
| _severely_ low due to human actions.
|
| Long-term thinking is possible, and two example that comes
| to mind are Tsunami Stones in Japan and Hunger Stones in
| Europe. After disastrous Tsunamis, people in Japan would
| sometimes inscribe rocks up on hills, warning people not to
| live near the water lower than the rock. And during severe
| droughts in Europe, large stones exposed in dry rivers
| would sometimes be inscribed with warning about famine; _"
| If you see me, cry"_
|
| Some of those stones are several hundred years old.
| America, particularly the western half, is substantially
| younger than many of these warning stones; the cultures
| inhabiting these regions today simply don't have much
| experience dealing with all the scenarios the land has to
| offer.
| avgcorrection wrote:
| That's terrible.
|
| Is the primary reason overconsumption from farming (70% of the
| consumption according to Yahoo News)? If so then I guess they
| could import more agricultural products. That's easier than
| having most of the residents use less water.
|
| But another problem might be: where would the food come from?
| California also has a drought problem. I don't know.
| scythe wrote:
| It's not the first time this has happened in the United States:
|
| http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Owens_Lake
| pfdietz wrote:
| It's not even the first time it's happened to the Aral Sea.
|
| https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv1kz4ggd.10
| nickt wrote:
| Indeed. Here's a discussion from yesterday for those who may
| have missed it:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34276519
| John23832 wrote:
| And it's sad, because it can all be averted. A modern day Dust
| Bowl.
| freediver wrote:
| Aral Sea: The sea that dried up in 40 years
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5N-_69cWyKo
|
| The Story of the Aral Sea's Disappearance
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsUYt9tlsos
| sitkack wrote:
| The _same_ thing is happening to California 's Central Valley.
|
| https://phys.org/news/2022-12-depletion-groundwater-californ...
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(page generated 2023-01-07 23:00 UTC)