QUICK FACTS
Where is it? Sivash, Crimean Peninsula [46.0627481, 34.3826701]
What’s within the picture? A sequence of shallow, multicolor lagoons often known as the “putrid sea”
Which satellite tv for pc took the picture? Landsat 8
When was it taken? Sept. 5, 2014
A deconstructed rainbow of round a dozen multicolor lagoons, collectively often known as the “putrid sea,” takes middle stage on this gorgeous satellite tv for pc picture captured round a decade in the past. The number of colours — starting from raspberry, peach and mustard to lime inexperienced, beige and good blue — are attributable to a number of components, together with the microorganisms that stay throughout the lagoons.
The lagoons stretch throughout the Sivash area — a roughly 3,900-square-mile (10,000 sq. kilometers) space of marshland throughout the northern Crimean Peninsula between the Black Sea to the west and the Sea of Azov to the east. The latter is separated from the lagoons solely by a slender piece of land often known as the Arabat Spit.
The colourful swimming pools are primarily between 2 and 4 toes (0.6 and 1.2 meters) deep, with some deeper swimming pools extending to depths of 10 toes (3 m). They are all hypersaline, that means that they comprise excessive ranges of minerals that make them salty, and have thick layers of silt throughout their bottoms, which may be as much as 16 toes (5 m) thick. The white shade surrounding most lagoons within the picture is a mixture of salt and silt.
The array of colours within the totally different lakes’ waters is partly as a result of their respective minerals, acidity and inhabiting vegetation. However, the principle driver of shade is the species of algae that bloom of their waters, in line with the U.S. Geological Survey. When the algae bloom in summer time, they may give off a pungent, rotten egg-like odor, which has earned the area its foul nickname.
Related: See all one of the best photos of Earth from area
Researchers estimate that there are round 220 million tons (200 million metric tons) of various minerals within the Sivash lagoons. As a outcome, the area can also be house to a big chemical plant, which siphons off a few of these minerals to assist create helpful chemical substances, in line with NASA’s Earth Observatory.
The lagoons comprise a spread of wildlife and are protected by the International Convention of Wetlands (ICW). The salty shallows are house to quite a lot of salt-resistant plant species, together with sea lavender (Limonium caspium) and saltbush (Atriplex aucheri), and host to as much as 1 million water birds that migrate to the realm each winter, in line with Ramsar which oversees the ICW.
The Sivash area has been a part of Ukraine because the dissolution of the Soviet Union. However, it has been below the management of Russia because the nation invaded Ukraine in 2022. (Other elements of the Crimean Peninsula have been annexed by Russia in 2014.)
But this isn’t the primary time that the Sivash has taken middle stage in conflicts throughout the area.
In November 1920, throughout the Russian Civil War, the Red Army — the military of the socialist motion headed by Vladimir Lenin — efficiently captured the Crimean Peninsula from the White Army — the troopers loyal to the outdated Russian empire — after taking down a serious stronghold at Perekop, positioned alongside the northern fringe of the lagoons.
Perekop was key to holding the Crimean Peninsula and had already efficiently repelled a number of front-on assaults. In order to lastly take the positioning, the Red Army launched a shock assault by wading miles via the lagoons at midnight and attacking the White Army from behind. The battle is called the Siege of Perekop.
