Зөвлөлт Холбоот Улсын үед антракс, салхин цэцэг, тахал зэрэг биологийн зэвсэг туршиж байсан Возрожсений арлууд нь Арал тэнгис ширгэсний улмаас 2001 онд эх газар лугаа холбогджээ.
Уг нарийн нийлмэл цогцолбор болох Аралск-7 нь Кантубек гэх цэргийн суурин болон лабораториуд, амьтан байрлуулах байрууд, задгай талбайн туршилтын полигоноос бүрдэж байв. 1936 оноос эхлэн биологийн экспедиц ажиллаж, тулареми, тахал, холерын чиглэлээр туршилт явуулж байсан бөгөөд 1954 оноос байгууламжийн өргөн хүрээтэй барилгын ажлууд эхэлжээ. Энэхүү нууц бүсэд антракс, жижиг цэцэг, тулареми, бруцеллез, түүнчлэн бусад олон төрлийн эмгэг төрүүлэгчдийг ашиглан туршилт хийж байсан нь хожим янз бүрийн ослоор хүний эрүүл мэндэд нөлөөлж байжээ.
Тухайлбал, 1971 онд арлын орчимд судалгааны хөлөг онгоцон дээрх эрдэмтэн салхин цэцэг өвчнөөр өвчилж, олон хүнийг хамарсан халдварын голомт үүсч байсан түүхтэй. Мөн 1988 онд ЗХУ-ын зүгээс 100 орчим тонн антраксыг цайруулагч бодис хольж уг арал дээрх нүхэнд булсан бөгөөд хожим АНУ-ын Батлан хамгаалах яамны эрдэмтэд хөрсний дээжинд амьд антраксын спорууд хадгалагдаж үлдсэнийг илрүүлжээ.
Арал тэнгисийн ус татагдаж, арал байхаа больсны дараа 2001 оны аравдугаар сарын 22-нд АНУ болон Узбекистан улсууд цэвэрлэгээний гэрээ байгуулж, 6 сая ам.долларын төсөвтэйгөөр үлдсэн барилга байгууламж болон 100 орчим хүний оролцоотойгоор антракс булсан 11 нүхийг ариутгах ажил гүйцэтгэжээ. Хэсэгчилсэн цэвэрлэгээний явцад хуучин лабораториуд болон хөрсөн дэх халдварыг саармагжуулсан боловч тухайн бүс нутагт хийгдсэн бүх туршилтын талбай болон амьтдын булшийг бүрэн цэвэрлэсэн эсэх нь тодорхойгүй үлдсэн байна.
Дэлгэрэнгүйг эх сурвалжаас харах
↓Эх сурвалжийг нээх ↓
Vozrozhdeniya Island, once a remote Soviet testing ground for anthrax, smallpox, plague and other biological agents, stopped being an island in 2001. The retreating Aral Sea connected the site to the mainland along the Uzbek-Kazakh border, removing the water barrier that had isolated the secret complex known as Aralsk-7.
A U.S.-Uzbek operation followed in 2002, targeting laboratories, buildings and anthrax burial pits left behind after the Soviet program ended. The documented cleanup covered specific parts of the complex, not every area used during decades of open-air testing.
Aralsk-7 combined a military settlement called Kantubek with laboratories, animal facilities and a testing range. At its height, the settlement housed as many as 1,500 military personnel and family members. One former senior Soviet biological-weapons official estimated that up to 150 scientists, technicians and soldiers worked at the research complex at any given time.
Aralsk-7 Combined a Closed Town With an Open-Air Test Range
Biological-weapons work on Vozrozhdeniya began before the permanent postwar complex was built. A Soviet military biology expedition arrived in 1936, followed by tests involving tularemia, plague and cholera in 1937. The work stopped during the Second World War and resumed afterward.
Construction of the later facility began in 1954. CIA aerial photographs taken in 1962 showed barracks, a parade ground, animal pens, research buildings and an open-air testing area on an island that also had fishing facilities.
Kantubek contained apartment buildings, a school, shops, a post office, a dining hall, a stadium, barracks and its own power station. Fresh water arrived by barge and was stored in large tanks. The nearby Barkhan airfield had four runways, allowing aircraft to land under changing wind conditions.
Several kilometres from the town stood a field research laboratory known by the Russian abbreviation PNIL. The southern part of the island served as the main range, where biological agents were released from aircraft or explosive devices. The program worked with anthrax, plague, smallpox, tularemia, brucellosis, typhus, Q fever and other pathogens.
The site’s layout was intended to let prevailing winds carry aerosol clouds away from Kantubek. Personnel carried out decontamination work after tests and underwent compulsory quarantine. During the 1980s, 500 monkeys used in research died after exposure to a tularemia strain. Their bodies were burned and the remains buried on the island.
Accidents Exposed the Program’s Risks
The island was linked to several incidents, although the evidence and causes differ.
In 1971, a scientist aboard the research vessel Lev Berg became ill after the ship entered a haze near the island. She was diagnosed with smallpox despite having been vaccinated. Nine other people became infected in her home town, and three died. The vessel was later found to have entered an aerosol cloud from a smallpox test.
The bodies of two missing fishermen were found in their boat the following year. They were thought to have contracted plague, but the cause was not confirmed.
In May 1988, 50,000 saiga antelope reportedly died on a nearby steppe within an hour. The deaths remained unexplained, and pollution or other causes could not be ruled out.
The Soviet biological-weapons program also operated facilities far from the Aral Sea. An April 1979 anthrax outbreak in Sverdlovsk, now Yekaterinburg, carries different death tolls in the supplied material. An East Carolina University archive gives a figure of at least 68 deaths, while a BBC Future examination of the Soviet program places the toll at no fewer than 105.
Soviet officials initially blamed infected meat. The role of an accident at a biological-warfare research facility was established more than a decade later.
The Shrinking Aral Sea Removes the Site’s Isolation
The Aral Sea was the world’s fourth-largest lake in 1964. Soviet projects diverted the Syr Darya and Amu Darya rivers during the 1950s and 1960s to irrigate fields growing cotton and other crops. Water levels fell, shorelines receded and large parts of the lakebed became exposed, a transformation documented by NASA Earth Observatory.
Vozrozhdeniya expanded as the water retreated. Its area grew almost tenfold during the 1990s. By 2001, the former island had joined the mainland and become part of a peninsula.
The Soviet program had already closed as the USSR collapsed. The Aralsk-7 military laboratory shut in November 1991, and Kantubek’s population was evacuated within weeks. The Arms Control Association’s report of the cleanup agreement places the final Soviet abandonment of the site in 1992. Buildings, equipment and civilian infrastructure were left behind.
Before withdrawing, the Soviet Union attempted to dispose of a large anthrax stockpile. In 1988, 100 to 200 tonnes of anthrax slurry were mixed with bleach, transported by barge and dumped into pits on Vozrozhdeniya. U.S. Defense Department scientists testing the site during the late 1990s later found viable anthrax spores in soil samples.
U.S.-Uzbek Teams Treat 11 Anthrax Burial Pits
The United States and Uzbekistan signed a cleanup agreement on October 22, 2001. The project had a budget of up to $6 million and aimed to dismantle about 20 buildings, decontaminate former laboratories and treat 11 anthrax burial pits.
One hundred local workers spent four months moving contaminated soil into a lined trench and treating it with thousands of kilograms of powdered bleach. After six days of treatment, tests found no surviving spores in the material.
The operation did not establish that every former testing area was free of biological material. The island also contained open-air ranges and burial pits holding infected animals. The documented U.S.-Uzbek project focused on the laboratories, about 20 buildings and the 11 identified anthrax pits.
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