Image of the Week - Dam Failure in Uzbekistan

The western wall of Uzbekistan's Sardoba Reservoir breached on May 1st, 2020 after a week of heavy rain. Thousands were evacuated as water rushed north into farmland and villages across the central Asian country and into neighboring Kazakhstan. Imagery from Europe's Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite shows water pooling across a wide area. In the May 4th image 3 days after the breach, the reservoir appears partially drained. The water stored in the Sardoba Reservoir is used for irrigation. This imagery indicates the extensive farmland in the region, largely cotton, a water-intensive crop. And because this region is upstream from the Aral Sea, these images help answer a question many people have about the disappearance of the large lake: Where did the Aral Sea water go? The answer: It's used to water all these crops.