<p>The drying up of the Aral Sea, once a large inland lake in Central Asia, is one of the greatest environmental disasters in history. Formerly the fourth largest lake in the world, the Aral Sea, began shrinking in the 1960s after the rivers (Amu Darya and Syr Darya) that fed it were diverted by Soviet irrigation projects. In this study, the Landsat series was used to map the water surface area from 1972 to 2024 and showed that the Aral Sea as of 2023 covered a mere 7.83% of its observed 1960 surface area. The decadal land use change analysis between the years 1992, 2000, 2010 and 2020 revealed that cropland increased by 3.2% and by 1.86% of its original area in the interval between 1992–2000 and 2000–2010 respectively. A decrease of 0.8% was observed in the cropland area in the 2010–2020 period. This decrease can be attributed to the increase in urban area along with the degradation of land as shown by the increased conversion of cropland to grassland and barren land. This suggests that while irrigation infrastructure helped in expanding the agricultural land in the earlier decades, the unlined irrigation canals and the salty dust that blows off from the exposed Aral seabed led to salinity problem in the region. Moreover, the region is dotted with numerous multi-purpose dams. This may lead to conflicts over water use between upstream nations having hydroelectric power needs and downstream nations’ irrigation requirements highlighting the necessity for coordinated water management across the region’s extensive reservoir network.</p>