Scientists have described the Aral sea as the site of the worst ecological disaster on earth.

科学家们把咸海描绘成地球上生态环境最差的地方。

A few years later, still attracted to the country, he returned to Uzbekistan to write an article about the disappearance of the Aral Sea.

几年后，他仍对乌兹别克斯坦心生向往，于是回到了这个国家并写了一篇关于咸海消失的文章。

The Aral Sea is actually not a sea at all.

实际上，咸海根本就不是海，而是一个满是淡水而又广袤的湖泊。

Can what remains of the Aral Sea be saved?

残留的咸海还能得救吗？

By 2000 the Northern and Southern Aral Sea had already separated.

2000年的时候咸海的北部和南部水域就已经断开。

This is not good but not so bad as for the Aral Sea and Mesopotamia.

对于咸海与美索不达米亚地区而言，这不是好消息，但也不是那么糟糕。

The Southern Aral, however, still remains a shadow of its former self.

然而，咸海的南部依然一如既往。

Baikonur lies by the 16 Syrdarya River, dangerously close to the 17 Aral Sea.

拜科努尔位于锡尔河畔，靠近咸海，危机四伏。

Satellite image of the Aral Sea used to be the fourth largest lake in the world

卫星图像显示咸海曾经是世界上第四大湖泊。

Most important, perhaps, one company, Aral Tuz, makes 80 percent of the edible salt.

也许最为重要的是咸海塔兹公司生产了80%的食用盐。

A visit to central Asia - to the shrinking and polluted Aral Sea, for example - provides evidence of that.

一次中亚细亚之行——比如奔赴正在收缩，并被严重污染的咸海——也会收集到此类证据。

Drive closer and the sharp white peaks turn out to be a small Alps of salt -the Aral Tuz Company stockpile.

当车辆靠近后，那白色的尖峰就变成了一个由盐构成的小阿尔卑斯山——那就是咸海塔兹(the Aral Tuz)公司的储备。

Before a Soviet Union irrigation project in the 1960s, the Aral Sea was the world's fourth largest lake.

60年代，在前苏联开始实行灌溉项目前，咸海(The Aral Sea)是世界上第四大湖泊。

Drive closer and the sharp white peaks turn out to be a small Alps of salt - the Aral Tuz Company stockpile.

当车辆靠近后，那白色的尖峰就变成了一个由盐构成的小阿尔卑斯山——那就是咸海塔兹(the Aral Tuz)公司的储备。

The Aral Sea supported a thriving commercial fishing industry employing roughly 60,000 people in the early 1960s.

咸海扶持了兴旺的商业捕鱼业。1960年代大概有6万人从事这一行业。

The Aral Sea supported a thriving commercial fishing industry employing roughly 60, 000 people in the early 1960s.

咸海扶持了兴旺的商业捕鱼业。1960年代大概有6万人从事这一行业。

On Friday, the European Space Agency released before-and-after satellite photographs of the Aral Sea in 2006 and 2009.

星期五，欧洲航天局公布了2006年至2009年前后有关咸海的卫星照片。

Situated between Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, the Aral was once the fourth largest lake on earth, as big as Ireland.

位于乌兹别克斯坦和哈萨克斯坦之间的咸海曾经是地球上的第四大湖泊，与爱尔兰一样大。

The World Water Council cites the Parana La Plata in South America, the Aral Sea, the Jordan and the Danube as examples.

世界水理事会援引南美洲拉普拉塔巴拉那河、咸海、约旦河和多瑙河为例。

For more details on the shrinking of the Aral Sea, please see the American University case study Aral Sea Loss and Cotton.

要查看更多有关咸海缩小的信息，请查看美国大学个案研究《咸海损失与棉花》。

If this goes on long enough, the Sea could face Owens Lake's and the Aral Sea's fate: becoming a wind-swept salt flat.

长此以往，死海将面临欧文湖和阿拉尔湖的命运：被风吹卷的盐面平地。

An inland lake, the Aral is found between Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan and used to be the fourth largest lake in the world.

作为一个内陆湖，咸海位于乌兹别克斯坦与哈萨克斯坦之间，而且曾经是世界上第四大湖泊。

Never the most hospitable of places, Karakalpakstan was then turned into a vast arena of destruction by the Aral Sea disaster.

卡拉卡尔帕克斯坦从来不是一个宜居的地方，由于咸海的生态灾难，这里变成了一个遭受到毁灭性破坏的辽阔区域。

In the grasslands of western Kazakhstan, roughly 320 kilometers (200 miles) north-northeast of the Aral Sea, lies Chiyli Crater.

在哈萨克斯坦西部的草原上，距离咸海东北偏北大约320公里(200英里)，有一个叫Chiyli(切利)的陨石坑。

Perhaps exaggerating, the UN Development Programme (UNDP) has said Lake Balkhash could turn into a salty mess, like the Aral Sea;

或许有些夸张，联合国开发计划署（UNDP）认为巴尔喀什湖将会像咸海那样变成一个肮脏的盐碱湖。

As recently as 1965, the Aral Sea received about 50 cubic kilometers of fresh water per year-a number that fell to zero by the early 1980s.

在1965年，每年大约有50立方公里淡水流入咸海，到20世纪80年代却几乎为零。

That change in chemistry has led to staggering alterations in the lake's ecology, causing precipitous drops in the Aral Sea’s fish population.

化学成分的改变极大地改变了湖区的生态环境，导致咸海鱼类数量剧减。

The draining of Kazakhstan's once-vast Aral Sea has made regional temperatures hotter in summer and colder in winter, and rain now rarely falls.

哈萨克斯坦曾经广阔的咸海的排干工程使得那里的夏天天气异常炎热、冬天天气异常寒冷，而且很少下雨的情况。

The destruction of the Aral Sea is one of the great engineering disasters of the 20th century, a mistake on a scale so vast that photographs from space are needed to capture it.

咸海的毁灭是二十世纪大型工程灾难，这个失误的规模太大了，只能从太空中捕捉其图片。