Russian sabotage of Ukraine's Kakhovka Dam leaves trail of devastation

KYIV -- One month on, Russia's destruction of the Kakhovka Dam in southern Ukraine continues to have a severe impact in Ukraine and the Black Sea region.

A blast destroyed the Kakhovka Dam upstream in the early hours of June 6, causing dozens of deaths, including of some rescuers and evacuees killed by Russian shelling in the frontline area.

Moscow and Kyiv deny responsibility for the disaster, but the dam is controlled by Russia and the Ukrainian army says that Moscow's aim was to halt a counteroffensive.

"Unfortunately, Russia has been controlling this dam and the entire Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant for more than a year," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a speech June 6.

"And it is physically impossible to blow it up somehow from the outside, by shelling," he said.

"This is the largest man-made environmental disaster in Europe in decades."

Before its destruction, the dam held 18 cubic km of water, which flooded the Dnipro river and nearby cities and villages.

The river returned to normal levels only two weeks ago.

The ground from which the water receded is now a dark brown stew of dead grass, destroyed crops and mud.

"It's a massive catastrophe for people, the environment, the economy -- everything," Ivan Antipenko, a correspondent for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty who lives in Kherson, told Caravanserai.

Many residents lost everything they had worked their whole lives to earn, and many houses are beyond repair, he said.

"The houses there are built from shell rock or washed adobe, or they're coated with clay. The walls pitched, and the roofs fell in and collapsed."

"You can't live there even if everything dries out a little because everything will fall to pieces. The water destroyed everything that was in the houses in an instant," Antipenko said.

Volunteers are still finding the bodies of those who were unable to reach safety, and many residents are still missing.

The situation on the left (eastern) bank of the Dnipro, which the Russians control, is especially murky, observers say.

"The Russian occupiers are saying that 47 people died, but the unofficial number is actually more than 500 because there is still no information about victims or casualties in four villages from Korsunka to Peschanka. The highway there was inundated immediately," Volodymyr Molchanov, an analyst at the Black Sea Centre for Political and Social Research, told Caravanserai.

So many residents died because the Russians made no efforts at rescue and did not let Ukrainian volunteers in, he said.

The Russians refused to evacuate anyone who who would not take a Russian passport and barred a United Nations humanitarian mission from entering the Russian-occupied left bank.

"They say that it's Russian territory, so if you want to help, enter from Russia. They didn't allow local or Ukrainian rescue workers to carry out rescue operations," Molchanov said.

"They stood at the roadblocks and just denied entry."

Catastrophe for the Black Sea

The disaster at the Kakhovka Dam has reverberated across the region.

In the wake of the explosion, more than 150 dead dolphins from Ukraine washed up on the shores of Bulgaria and Turkey, Andriy Yermak, Zelenskyy's chief of staff, wrote on June 20 on Telegram.

"It's entirely possible that the current will sweep deer, foxes and rabbits away from southern Ukraine and into those countries. About 20,000 wild animals lived in the flooded region," Yermak wrote.

Some of those species could disappear forever.

Three endemic species of small rodents "have most likely died out forever", Natalia Gozak, an analyst at the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), told Caravanserai.

"Seventy percent of their population was in the area that was flooded. If all of that was inundated, they'll disappear soon," Gozak said, adding that fish are still dying in the region.

Pollution spread by the flooding has also raised wildlife concerns.

Because of the dam's destruction, the fishing industry could be facing 4 billion UAH ($108 million) in losses from the death of adult animals alone, according to the Ukrainian Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food.

"The most substantial organic pollution headed into the Black Sea. In the future we can expect to see the water turn bright green from algae, and there will be less oxygen, which will cause fish and other animal species in the Black Sea to die out," Gozak said.

Since the explosion at the Kakhovka Dam, the current has been carrying trash, cars and even parts of houses all along the northwestern part of the Black Sea.

There will be a desert

The destruction of the dam also means that the reservoir has dried up.

The silt left behind is 20cm deep, and the land has become unfit for agriculture.

Moreover, the explosion has left about a million residents without drinking water.

On June 6, the Ministry of Agrarian Policy and Food posted on its website that because of the dam's loss, "fields in southern Ukraine could turn into a desert as soon as next year".

"This is a crime against humanity. Now these open shores are drying out. There is no vegetation there, and after a while it will be a desert region," said Gozak of the WWF.

"Next season, we'll see these agricultural regions suffer without water. And how will the population there survive?" Gozak said.

The contamination of wells by nitrates from the fields and by pathogens is dangerous, say environmentalists

Local residents' lack of access to suitable medical services or to drinking water has led to documented outbreaks of hepatitis A and the threat of other diseases.

"There is also Vibrio cholerae in the water ... It goes without saying that one must not consume it. All this contaminated water ended up in the wells -- it didn't go anywhere. It shouldn't be used at all," Gozak said.