When Maria Zadneprovskaya first saw the Aral Sea in 2021, she was overcome by a raw, deep sadness. "It felt like a real catastrophe," says the environmental expert, walking across the dried seabed ...

This story appears in the June 2015 issue of National Geographic magazine. “This is what the end of the world looks like,” says Yusup Kamalov, sweeping his hand toward the scrub-covered desert ...