Miracle in the Desert: The Rise and Fall of the Salton Sea - Documentary
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 27 พ.ค. 2023
- The Salton Sea is an unfolding environmental disaster of extraordinary magnitude. As the largest lake in California begins to dry, millions of lives are in danger as clouds of toxic dust, massive fish kills and the destruction of an entire ecosystem threatens the health of millions of underrepresented minorities in Southern California, many of who have no voice or little representation in the state legislature. If the state of California does not act quickly, it will be the worst environmental disaster of a generation and cause up to 70 billion dollars in health and other related damages to the area and its residents.
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My family started camping at Bombay Beach in '36 and we built our house there in '53. We used it as a vacation property to Ski, fish, swim, dune buggy and ride Motorcycles. Then we moved there full time and ran a business in '73. Kathleen in '76 was a disaster for everyone and two blocks of town went under water. We asked for help from the County but were told to abandon the town. We built our own dike and walled off the flooded area and used our own money and equipment only to have the Army Corp of engineers condemn it as ''poorly built''. Ha!....so poorly built it STILL stands today and never leaked or was breached! The county still treats us as pariah while they take our tax money and we get NOTHING! The rise in water level was the real end of the dream as the State Park campgrounds were flooded and the visitors stopped coming on the big holiday weekends which destroyed us all economically. The Irrigation district let the farms dump the excess water and salt into the Sea and didn't care what it did to us. All these talks and plans are just money changing hands with Politicians profiting with no real desire to fix it. After 70 years we gave up and walked away. I will never get to pass it on to my Kid but I will always have the memories of the best times of my life in Bombay Beach and I wouldn't trade the hardships of living in the middle of nowhere for City life! Other than the 3 hours a day on a school bus, it was a fantastic place to grow up!
Wow thats awesome. Atleast you got to enjoy and grow up in a awesome place that sounds like had it all. I think most us native Southern Californians (Orange County for mua) can kinda relate though. The very best place to grow up is sadly trashed now. Over everything, (crowded mostly) and just not the same. Not really a pass it down thing anymore. Atleast thats how I feel.
Our politicians are WORTHLESS!
So interesting
❤❤❤
Same
Between the Owens River Valley ecological disaster and the Salton Sea, it looks like CA has spent the better part of 100 years destroying its environment.
Haha! The Owens valley is such a great story! Tragic and amazing at the same time.
Politicians are ready, willing and able to destroy anything that doesn't fit into their agenda.
California's environment is every Earthly inhabitants environment. Wind carries.
@@wholylove China's environment is everyone's environment.
@trwsandford This is Truth. These titles and names of places keep humans territorial to a name or title. If you see the entire Earth as your responsibility and do your part, you will see the Future and be Living in Truth. Otherwise, like all humans in the past, be stuck in the past and be false or non existent. Be Present Minded and Future Focused! The Future is here!
This is one of the better documentaries I've seen on the Salton Sea, particularly in its accidental creation in the early 1900s. The lake is one of many symptoms of the megadrought of the region and the overtaxed Colorado River system. Given the lake was engineered into existence (albeit accidentally), I do wonder if more engineering of a solution will have further unintended consequences. The sea to sea canal system does seem to have the most merit.
I've visited the area and it is indeed fascinating and weird. And I do hope they can find a solution for the people in the region.
Agreed. The lithium bust of 2023 [the price dropped 93%] ended the big plans to mine and restore Salton Sea, just another disappointment for the area. It's no longer profitable to mine lithium as the EV market has collapsed worldwide.
The Salton Sea is not supposed to be. It was an accident.
Then why do they keep adding the water from irrigating crops that’s filled with pesticides? Accident or a place to dump all their waste and turn a blind eye 👁️!
Amazing video. Sad that only 10k people have seen this.
This was never meant to be per the video. I was created by accident. The fish was transplanted and not native. Now that they have corrected the accidental water inflow, the lake is disappearing. This is an artificial environment that is self correcting, I suggest you get some plows our there to plow the new shore lines and plant native grasses and native rocks/gravel to return the area to the desert.
What a fantastic documentary!
Never get tired of learning history.
I do hope the sea will be saved.
Would love to go back in time to the 60s when the sea was a fun and happening place.
Thank you so much for posting this!
I would like to go back to the 60s when Venice Beach was fun
An amazing documentary about a southern california tragedy. It is unbelievable that a state monument as large as the Salton Sea has gotten so little assistance and attention.
It's not surprising at all...Newsom only cares about the liberal large cities in California...that's where all the votes are
Its now getting a lot of attention because they have discovered large deposits of lithium in that area.
The USA previously used it as a atomic bomb site ,
Ameeeeeericaaaaaaaa
@@colemcclain7319no atomic bombs wwre ever tested there. However, it was used for training for bombing runs.
This was a man made lake. Owens Lake was a natural made lake. Totally different.
What a gigantic clusterfuck. 1 right after the other. I've heard so many different stories about the Salton Sea from many different documentaries and not one of them explained it quite like this one.
You Said cluster
Great work!
And I feel their pain I was there as a little kid I don't forget such a beautiful place
Great doc
Just flew over the Salton Sea today on my way to SD from Boston. An amazing sight from the sky.
Very fascinating documentary 👍,..thank you 🙏I learned a lot.
To all the people suggesting to put in plants to control dust: Good thought but the soil structure and stability has been destroyed by being inundated. Otherwise plants would have found their way to the area and grown on their own. Plants are really good at that. Plants need soil in order to live. What's left in the lake bed is just dirt.
It could definitely work. You start of with the most drought resistant trees and plants and create ditches filled with water Then, slowly over time, the debris from the trees adds organic matter in the dirt, the shade from the trees cool down the area then that makes the soil be able to hold water better and longer. From there on it will attract birds and animals that will poop in the area enriching the soil further and so on.
Watch the project greening the desert.
Love how it is returning back to its natural state and people seem to think that is bad and want to spend tax dollars to try and keep it un-natural.
It's mystifying to me that with no properties in San Diego County available for under $1 million, there's still no incentive to revitalize this area. We have too many people competing for too few houses. It sounds like what they tried to make this place into 60 years ago is much more needed today.
Dude, it's a lost cause . It was formed as a result of a mans' mistake, let's not throw good money after bad. It will only require more and more bailouts. If our negligent Democrats would stop the MASSIVE INVASION of our border & stop giving a monthly Social Security check to all the lawbreakers, we might have extra cash.
This is heartbreaking.
The Salton Sea is a fascinating place. I hope you're successful restoring it.
It was a manmade mistake. It’s great that people enjoyed it but any body of water with no outlet or inlet is doomed. What should they do-divert the Colorado again? Of course not.
No, did you watch until the end? AT 1:10:53 the proposed solution is called "Sea to Sea"... to dig a canal from the Sea of Cortez (Gulf of California) to the Salton Sea. It's down hill the entire way and there's an endless supply of water. It's not that far of a canal that would need to be built.
This is absolutely a wonderful video that there's people that still care
Just came back from Bombay Beach. Such a fascinating place.
Thank you for sharing, hope to see some positive action, will advocate
I am not sure about this, you cant fight nature, this sea is not supposed to be there, dust storms are part of the desert.
II am sorry for all the people that live there but all it needs is water and the big cities are not going to give it up.
I have been there many times, I have even been in the water and I love the desert.
I agree. It is man made. The dust would probably be worse without it. Yes, it is a haven for migratory birds. What did they do before we created it?
@@curtwalters8328 the birds can go to the other lake in central California that came back because it is a natural lake that they tried to make farm land on, you can’t mess with mother nature.
Thank you for your comment 😊
Best history lesson ever?
People will always take something nice and ruin it
People didn't ruin it nature did
This was a very well produced documentary. No hidden agendas, just facts.
This area was never part of Mother Nature’s plan. Now because of greed to grow crops in the desert it is one of the largest man made environmental disaster of all time. Mother Nature plays chess and man plays checkers.
Bet a class action suit against the state and EPA would get some attention (as in PG&E over its culpability for the Hinkley groundwater contamination) , since the health hazards of toxic dust are such a wide danger, not to mention the compromized wildlife. If they can allocate multimillions on a bullet train to nowhere, they can better spend money to save lives. Salton Sea is so far out in the boonies that Sacramento thinks no one will notice or care. I grew up in Palm Springs and remember our family fishing on the sea and camping there in the 80s. This is a very important documentary and I appreciate getting a full picture of the situation.
The Salton Sea is sitting on top of the most abundant Lithium resources in the U.S. Not a surprise that reclamation efforts are stalled.
Whatever private entity receives the mining rights should also be responsible for dredging and disposing the toxic sediment layer that built-up from the decades of run-off having flowed into the lake. That will help save a lot of lives in exchange for the billions and even trillions to be made in revenue from Lithium mining. The Salton Sea will go from a massive body of water to a massive quarry and hole in the ground in the blink of an eye.
Brilliantly done with the proper sense of urgency. Couldn't help but notice that the stock footage at 45:02 supposedly of Eisenhower Medical Center is actually of DC EMS and MPD units at the corner of Georgia Avenue and Taylor Streets NW in Washington DC. Since I live in DC, that kinda stuck out. But thank you for an outstanding documentary.
This was super interesting. I heard or salton sea and looked for more info and found this. It’s sad how tragic this is for both humans and animals and nobody even knows about it.
There was a lake in the Former USSR that met a similar fate
The Aral Sea.
These guys really knew how to mustache.
I first became interested in the Salton Sea as an engineer. About twenty years ago I designed some steam valves for a California Energy geothermal plant there. The canal to the Sea of Cortez seems like such a straightforward solution. Does anyone here know why this hasn't been acted upon?
Mexico won't allow it
@@QuangPham-hm7fmsources?
No one will fix it because it makes sense.
Great videos, I love to see the sea how it once was 😢
We have a similar situation in Orange County. We divert the Santa Ana river into catch basins in the north. It is for flood control and refreshing our aquifer. Migrating birds now rely on them, yet they are artificial. The only time the river runs to the sea is under very heavy rain. I used to surf at Newport (too many years ago), but the water always flowed.
It is a good thing, man helping nature and nature helping man.
well done!!
It shouldn't have happened in the first place! The sea was the result of developer greed in the first place. How is it that the companies and railroad responsible weren't bankrupted paying for mitigation or even reversal of the results?? MAKE THEM PAY!!! 🤬🤬🤬 ONCE AGAIN, IT IS THE TAXPAYERS WHO FOOT THE BILL AND GET TO SUFFER
Was just in Palm Springs on vaca, looking for touristy things to do with my wife. Noticed 'Salton Sea' on some maps, etc... Researched it as a possible day trip. Was stunned to learn of its history & present state. We did not visit due to air quality concerns. Truly a shame, the inaction of those with power.
The action is there, it is being allowed to dry up. The Mistake Lake is being returned to Mother Nature
So we just had a tropical storm that dumped a years worth of water in a day. We also had tons of rain in the first 3 months of this year. There has to be water in the Salton Sea now. My husband and I drove down there to check it out because he had gone there numerous times in the 50s and 60s with his dad to boat and fish. The Sand was really skeletons of sea creachers and Fisk and smelled like it too. We didn't stay 6 once we were back in the car, we noticed our shoes stank from our walk on the shore. Still, I'm glad we went because I've always been interested in the Salton Sea, having grown up in a beach town in So Cal, and seeing all the commercials for S.S. on TV. I was happy when Sonny Bono was mayor of Palm Spring, and then in congress and was trying to get things done to fix the S.S. Too bad he passed away before anything got done. After that it was forgotten again.
@Juneisthebestmonth Bringing water to the valley made it possible for all that still extant Imperial Valley farmland, but the SS destruction has created a toxic situation for people and wildlife. At very least undoing that damage would be best, and a relatively straightforward solution is that canal from the Sea of Cortez. If you go to the SS, look at the mountains around it. It used to be ocean, and you can see fossil shells clear up to the waterline still visible on the mountains. I could see that line in the documentary. So, basically, the ocean was there first.
Could it be possible that government/corporate entities WANT it to dry up? Lithium deposits are so valuable that i think they will sacrifice the Salton Sea for rechargable batteries
Sadly I think you are right. Lithium mining will turn what is already a social, environmental and economic catastrophe into an absolute hellscape.
Cool one
Fixing ONE spot does nothing. It fixes nothing.
As a Cali native having skiied at Salton Sea many times. Viewing this is disturbing yet not near so much as the memories of years of politicians who did nothing to better a beautiful area. I'm glad I moved as I see the truth from a distance.
Incredibly well made and interesting documentary, I learned a lot from this!
I found this because I was learning some history about the Colorado river and I was looking around on google maps and I wondered where all the water went, I learned about the canals and how the river have changed course, then I searched for the salton sea and found this documentary, very interesting!
Really interesting. Great documentary. One thing... The ads are way too loud. They are louder than the documentary and very jarring.
Saltin Sea is a truly special place. Have visited many times over the last 20 years. I have read about proposed lithium mining in the area I wonder if the states lack of effort has something to do with that.
🤔
Only way to save is to connect Salton Sea to Sea of Cortez, the biggest engineering, economic project. It may provide a miraculous solution for border problem, CA/Mexico economy and potential environmental disaster. Let’s start the biggest man made project on this planet! Salton to Cortez!
A wish list.
Spending money will not CREATE water.
The salton sea is beautiful. I have never personally been there but the pictures are magnificent. Californian's need to wake up and see the beauty that is the salton sea. The largest lake in all of California is dying all of its beauty is being distorted due to water and money mismanagement. Californian's this will effect all of you. Listen to those who live along the salton sea. They are suffering and dying because of your disrespectful inactivity to help this area thrive and because no one famous, rich, or powerful in the political world lives there. How could you all ignore the hazardous problems that all of you have created by diverting to much water away from the salton sea. The ecosystem that is the salton sea exists no where else in the world. Don't turn your back on the people who have called this place home .what if it was your child suffering an illness that is as deadly what is going on here. All of California is responsible for what goes on in every inch of the state. Water has to come from some where. Can't the coastal cities create desalination plants to provide there citizens with the water they need from the ocean? Where are all the conservationists gone? I hope they listen to all of you that love along the beautiful salton sea. Keep up the hard fight. Greetings from Pennsylvania.
Why aren’t you helping?
I am from Long Island, and the only time I ever actually got to see the Salton Sea was during a Santa Ana and I wasn’t really able to enjoy the experience of seeing it that closely but I did detect that it had seen better days
This is a very good telling of human opportunism and how it seldom overrides what Mother Nature has to say.
It was once Lake Cahuilla, last full of water in c. 1470 (estimated date)?
Bringing water from the Laguna Salada? Did you ask Mexico permission to do that? Isn’t that going to dry the Laguna Salada and create the same problem we have in Salton Sea.
That's why the water needs to come from the ocean.
Sea water from the sea of Cortez would fill up laguna salada and the Saltonsea with sea water a WIN for both sides of the boarder??????
Great ideas at the end of the film. I live in El Centro with a 8 year old and you would never guess he has problems with his breathing. What a surprise!!! All I want to know now is how do I get a Salton sea yacht club hoodie or long sleeve Tee shirt. Maybe make some money for the cleanup with shirt sales. JK. But seriously I would definitely rock them if they sale them
Any money would be better spent relocating the populations.
I’m from Austin, Texas. A city that huge is huge on Xeriscaping, as is the rest of the state. Landscaping with little or no water. California is big on watering lawns. That’s one place where the water is going. Actually down the drain. Get the mindset and culture to change. You live in the desert, you want your green grass and you are running out of water.
Sad. Hopefully lithium mining witch wasn't an issue when this was recorded doesn't seal the fats of the sea.
my last encounter with these issues was reading a book by william volman about the imperial valley. At the end of the book, the political power play by which the IID lost 25% of its original water allotment was only just developing. It's now 20 years later, and the consequences are not pretty. The feds were involved at the very beginning. As this doc references in conclusion, they will simply have to be involved once again, before this crisis can be resolved.
Under the Salton Sea is one of the largest lithium deposits in the world. So little chance that it will ever be re-filled.
This was very interesting. I am from the Los Angeles area, and knew very little about the Salton Sea until I explored it on my own as an adult. It is fascinating. I wish I could have been there during its heyday in the mid-20th century. Even I my childhood in the 80s, it would have had more going on than today, but I really didnt know about it. I wish I had. Michelle's story about Marie made me cry. She asked why no one was doing anything about this. Why indeed?
Crying :(
What an interesting documentary. I am watching from the UK and came across this place after watching a van life you tuber who stayed here, and interested to know more after what he said about the history, I decided to fo a bit of research about this area. Really interesting about how it came about and its sad demise. I'm interested what environmental progress took place since the film was made, but probably more promises without fruition like all governments across the world. The you tuber who was there this January, visiting slab city, chose to sleep on the 'beach' in Salton city and it still looked abandoned and forgotten. Did you guys get any help?
Wherever you're from 'they' just don't care about the people, eh? 😢
been there many times. It's so sad. BUT. A sea is NOT supposed to BE there. sometimes Land will NOT be subject to man's whims.
I really don’t see why they never built a canal from the sea of Cortez to regulate the Salton Sea water level. Hopefully with some of the Lithium money we can build that.
This was very educational. We have similar situation going on here in Utah with The Great Salt Lake. Bottom line of all these issues is "A mouth will say anything" when it comes to Politics. I take it this Documentary was done in 2019? What is the latest news on the Salton Sea? The Hurricane that hit southern California in September, did that add any water to the Salton Sea?
It’s still slowing drying up, lost about 15 foots of shore line in since the video release. All the farm land and canals take just about all the rain run off out of the equation. What people aren’t saying is that the town of Mexicali runs all their sewage into the salton sea or it’d be dry already.
Who would have thought that turning a dry desert into a sea would have had lasting environmental effects like flooding and the land going back to being a desert? Environmental engineering is a thing for a reason.
The problem is you need more water. Where do you want it to come from? The Colorado River hardly exists by the time it gets to the imperial valley.
😢
Well.
Having only seen it from the hiway a ways iff it does look quite magnificent like a blue jewel in the desert.
That area out there is about like being in Suadi Arabie.
In November 2023, the state of California declared the Salton Sea has one of the worlds largest deposits of lithium which is used in electric gadgets such as cars and telephones. They projected a lithium mining business in the area could raise billions of dollars. This is not mentioned at all in your documentary probably because it’s just a recent development. But that lithium money could help restore the area for the current residence as well as new residence who would work extracting lithium. Also, I think the canal idea is a great one. Another thing not mentioned would be the Canal to the sea could bring cargo ships to the area. South west United States, which is basically empty land and could house millions of people and a vibrant economy. Get on it!!
I've been interested in this since playing Believe It or Not Grand theft Auto 5
Where it has a town similar to that. Only they call it Sandy shores and the Alamo sea.
I like that place
I would like to see it no matter what anyone says
I had the exact same thought -- never been there except in a dream that was rendered by a game console. It is amazing even in a simulation.
@@oscarbravo9009beautiful
The Alamo Sea is based on the Salton Sea, although obviously a scaled-down version of it. I've not played GTAV, but I believe that Sandy Shores is meant to be Bombay Beach and even the old North Shore Motel is in there too. I guess one of the game devs had either been there or was just fascinated by it like many people seem to be.
Very interesting documentory!😮
We used to camp there in the 60's, I was about 7 yrs old. They had GIANT red ants. I did'nt like them crawling on my feet. My Uncle told me calm down, they are harmless. So i let them crawl. Then all of a sudden they clasped their large mandibles into my flesh. I have been facinated by ants ever since. Ant Farms as a kid. 😊
I thought it was too hot and windy for camping. Saw an RV get tossed around, upside down.
Did you know it a geothermic active area? As a child i rembember hot springs in the area. So hot it was baricaded from a spa. Im a SoCal native, and they have constant earthquakes. The dreaded San Andres fault goes right through it up to LA. Just today they had a small 2.9
That place just wants to be a desert. Maybe that’s what it should be. Perhaps the seabed is leveled and becomes a shallower sea - just enough to keep down the dust.
So it's 2024 now and any updates?
Sadly, I would say the Salton Sea 🌊 is a lost cause!
The *only* fix is a pipeline or channel to the Sea of Cortez to refill the Salton Sea. Ultimately it will cost less than either inaction or the other sticking plaster 'solutions' that have been mooted (involving ponds, spraying the playa etc.), and allow the habitat to regenerate and maybe even some tourism and recreational use to return. It's an absolute no brainer - time for the powers that be to get it done already, before there's nothing left out there to save.
Why won't people just move away if it's that bad there? Also the documentary repeats the same points too many times which makes it distracting. You should cut half of it so that it doesn't keep repeating itself too much. You don't have to interview 20 people back to back saying exact same things.
Clifford DeRouen U S M C.
If you have problematic with your breathing and so forth you should move to a place more suitable for your situation.
So your solution is to take MORE water from the sea.
This is the undoing of destruction.
This is just another issue that the ineffective supermajority in Sacramento is doing to destroy California. I was born and raised in Orange County but fled to Texas due to the idiotic government decisions that Sacramento has been making.
how much would it cost to plant a bunch of desert plants where the sea is as it dries up?? that would help stop the dust no?
If it could grow there, it would. Unfortunately the soil is completely inundated with pollution and heavy salt deposits.
@@Johnman3341 oh that makes sense, dang.. is there any way they kind mine for the salt? Sorry I’m completely not educated on this kinda of stuff, but hope there’s a solution of some kind
I wish I would have been there when everyone jumped ship. Criddling must have been incredible!
Everybody is waiting for someone else to do something why don' they plant shrubs? one person then another and then another?
The lady with asthma said her life is there. But she really has no life. I’ve been moving my whole life. I know no one when I get to the new place. You make new friends. You get local support. If she stays there, she’s creating her own demise. The state is not going to make anything better for her. Just move. Pack a bag, take your kids and go. Think outside the box.
She also explicitly said, she doesn’t have the money to do that.
What a fabulous documentary. Very interesting and educational I never knew the history of the Salton Sea.
If I lived anywhere close to that area, I would move as soon as I had a chance. because the politicians in California are not going to actually fix this problem, it's only going to get worse till it becomes a disaster.
You're right, they would rather dump dollars into a never-ending bullet train then fix this problem, which would benefit far more people and a very large area.
They have neglected this fantastic place miserably.... Hopefully they will take care of the Salton sea before it is too late .
There was NEVER supposed to be a lake there. Taxpayers are supposed to pay for a lake that didn’t exist before some developers bungled in to an inland sea. No thanks.
Yes thanks I'm camping here for the first time and this place needs to exist and I hope they turn it around and save it I love this place and you will too if you ever decide to go.
This could be ne New vegas
1:06:28 That is destruction. Your Spirit is asking you to leave an environment that is weak, it only causes you weakness.
Thanks for this great documentary! Hopefully, with the prospects of lithium in the area, the USA government can pay the Mexican government for rights to dig a "Sea to Sea" canal from The Sea of Cortez to the The Salton Sea. If not, all of SoCal may become a toxic cloud. I've even heard the canal could benefit Mexico's economy because towns could be built along the canal for tourists to visit etc..
I feel for the young lady and her sister with asthma. I wonder if people could make some kind of filtration system in their homes?
Who ever took the water must pay!
Such a fascinating history here. It is deeply disturbing and yet also understandable given the dwindling supply of the Colorado River, that California legislators seem to be prioritizing the water usage needs of LA and San Diego over the people living on the Salton Sea. I gather there is a prevailing opinion that the Salton Sea is viewed as an ecological disaster that should never have happened, and therefore, isn't worthy of the time, attention, and the money that is needed to make it habitable again. However, real people live there and call it home, and so for them reviving the lake is imperative. Its presence as significant marshlands for migrating birds is also a strong argument for rehabilitation. I wonder if it is time to stop relying on the government to solve the problem and start carefully vetting some innovative investors who might be willing to take on the challenge. Linking (or relinking) the Salton Sea to the Sea of Cortez sounds like a potential solution that would not be a far cry from its historical natural state.
Trevor? You there?
This is like what happened to the Aral Sea in Asia. It's an absolute eco disaster
4:44
Yeah, that's not how to use an inhaler.
😂
It's not the bigest??
Isn't Tulare bigger
This is a theory, based on recent history, to me, sounds like permitting a disaster could give the government a way to gain control and dependency over a large area. So why would they stop it?