DRYING UP!

Gisborne Times, Volume LXXXV, Issue 12912, 14 July 1936, Page 5

DRYING UP!

DANGER TO CASPIAN SEA WIT AT WIT A, CAVIAR EATERS DO THEN ? MOSCOW. June 2. Soviet, natural scientists .said today they believe that Caspian Sea, the world’s richest source of caviar, is drying up. In Baku Harbor, a: deep-water port, a. fortress lias appeared. The investigators say the. cm battlements. were constructed 800 years ago. by Persian Shall,si as an outpost in the centuries of struggles between Russian arid Persian armies. Long ago it sank far below the, surface of the sea in an earthquake, but the sturdy walls remain. After years investigation, the natural. scientists have tabulated the drying-up process of the Caspian, B. ApololT, government, investigator, said the damming of rivers for irrigation was partially responsible. Last March the Casp-’nn dropped to the lowest level in r. century and only now is beginning to rise again. The water from melting : cc in the northern tributaries of the Volga and.other rivers reaches the Caspr'an at this time, of the year, but calculations are that a new 1 low record will be reached again in December. During the last century, they estimate, the surface; of the sea has been reduced by thousands of square miles