Aral Sea
Dike Kokaral is a 12 km long dam across a narrow stretch of the Aral Sea, splitting off the North Aral Sea (also called "The Small Sea") from the much larger South Aral Sea ("The Large Sea"). The dike is conserving the dwindling waters of the Syr Darya river and maintaining (and attempting to revive) the damaged ecology of the North Aral Sea, at the expense of sealing the fate of the larger South Aral. Work was completed in August 2005, with help from the World Bank. Dike Kokaral is named after the Kokaral peninsula (an island until the 1960s), which would connect it to the other shore of the Aral Sea and separate the northern from the southern seas.