»The Mystery of the Disappearing Inland Sea

The modern story of the Aral Sea is not a mystery: The Art of Mapping on the Run is the New York Times' perspective: 'In the new edition of “The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World” (Times Books, London, 2007), for instance, there are before-and-after views of the Aral Sea, once the world’s fourth-largest lake. It shriveled as Soviet-era irrigation projects siphoned off the rivers that replenished it. A dam completed in 2005 now prevents water from flowing out of the lake’s northern lobe, which is expanding as a result.' The BBC perspective is less philosophical, and bluntly explains that the folly of human industry caused the changes to the sea.

Somewhere in a box we have a massive copy of the Times Atlas, probably from '04, and I wonder how the Aral looks in that one.