Vanishing Great Salt Lake
Channel: Tom Yulsman
Date: 2022-07-23

Thanks to drought and overuse of water, Utah's once great Salt Lake has shrunk by two thirds. On July 3, 2022, it reached its lowest level in 175 years of record keeping. 

To provide a sense of just how much the lake has shrunk — and also to call attention to a major problem this is causing — I created this virtual flyover of the lake. To produce it, I used imagery acquired by the Sentinel 2 satellite on July 9, 2022, and an interactive online tool called the Sentinel Hub EO Browser. 

As the lake has shrunk, huge expanses of former lakebed have been exposed. The sediments of the lakebed contain arsenic and other contaminants from human activities such as mining. High winds could pick some of these toxic materials and blow them over Salt Lake City and other developed areas of the Wasatch Front. 

Starved of adequate fresh water input, the lake is getting saltier. Scientists are concerned that this could lead soon to massive die-offs of tiny brine shrimp. That would pose a significant threat to 10 million migratory birds that feed on the crustaceans during their stop-overs at the lake each year.

For more details, please see this story I wrote for Discover magazine: https://www.discovermagazine.com/environment/a-virtual-3d-satellite-fly-over-of-utahs-once-great-salt-lake-reveals