But it is thanks to another Soviet project that it is one of the deadliest places on the planet.įrom the 1970s, the island has been implicated in a number of sinister incidents. Now Vozrozhdeniya has swallowed up so much of the sea that it’s swelled to 10 times its original size, and is connected to the mainland by a peninsula.

This is a place where the mercury regularly hits 60C (140F) in the sandy soil, and where the only signs of life are the skeletons of desiccated trees and camels shading under giant, stranded boats. Today, a layer of salty sand, riddled with carcinogenic pesticides, is all that remains of the ancient oasis. Vozrozhdeniya was once home to a vibrant fishing village fringed by turquoise lagoons, back when the Aral Sea was the fourth-largest in the world and abundant with fish.īut after years of abuse by the Soviets, the waters have receded and the sea has turned to dust the rivers that fed it were diverted to irrigate cotton fields. Or at least, something that used to be an island. On the Kazakh-Uzbek border, surrounded by miles of toxic desert, lies an island.

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