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Photo credits

Credits

Photo credits

With thanks to the photographers and agencies who publish their work openly. Most documentary images on this site come from Solmaz Daryani’s long-term project on Lake Urmia and the Hamoun wetlands; satellite images come from NASA.

A man and a boy stand beside a fishing boat stranded on dry land where the Hamoun wetland used to be.

Hamoun wetlands, Sistan

Solmaz Daryani · CC BY-SA 4.0

A group of people walk across dry ground near the receding shore of Lake Urmia.

Lake Urmia

Solmaz Daryani · CC BY-SA 4.0

Lake Urmia seen from the International Space Station: red and pink brine surrounded by white salt flats.

Lake Urmia from orbit

NASA Johnson Space Center · Public domain

Two women in long veils walk under tamarisk trees in a village covered by wind-blown sand.

Hamoun, Iran–Afghanistan border

Solmaz Daryani · CC BY-SA 4.0

An abandoned greenhouse, its plastic torn to shreds, half-buried in sand.

Hamoun region

Solmaz Daryani · CC BY-SA 4.0

Colourful pedal boats sit on a salt crust beside a shrinking pool of reddish water at Lake Urmia.

Lake Urmia

Solmaz Daryani · CC BY-SA 4.0

The moon rises over the salt flats of Lake Urmia at dusk; small figures stand at the water’s edge.

Lake Urmia at dusk

Solmaz Daryani · CC BY-SA 4.0

Satellite image of Lake Urmia in September 2020, with green-blue water filling most of the basin.

Lake Urmia, September 2020

NASA Earth Observatory / Lauren Dauphin (Landsat, USGS) · Public domain

Satellite image of Lake Urmia in September 2023, almost entirely white salt flat.

Lake Urmia, September 2023

NASA Earth Observatory / Lauren Dauphin (Landsat, USGS) · Public domain

Satellite view of a vast plume of dust blowing across eastern Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Dust storm seen from orbit

MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC · Public domain

Aerial view of a salt-crusted, cracked wetland bed with a small remaining pool of water.

Gavkhouni wetland, Isfahan

Jamshid Hosseini · CC BY 4.0

Dead, leafless trees scattered across a dry, dusty valley in central Iran.

Bidakhavid, Yazd

Z110 · CC BY-SA 4.0

Satellite view of the Hamoun basin: pale dry lakebeds with only small patches of blue water.

Hamoun basin from orbit

MODIS Land Rapid Response Team, NASA GSFC · Public domain

A white crust of salt stretches to a rocky island on the dried bed of Lake Urmia.

Salt flats of Lake Urmia

Ninara · CC BY 2.0

Images have been resized and cropped for the web. Adapted versions of CC BY-SA works are available under the same licence.