Kantubek
Kantubek was a town on Vozrozhdeniya Island in the Aral Sea. The town is still found on maps, but is uninhabited and lies in ruins today. Kantubek used to have a population of approximately 1,500 and housed scientists and employees of the Soviet Union's top-secret Aralsk-7 biological weapons research and test site.
Brian Hayes, a biochemical engineer with the United States Threat Reduction Agency, led an expedition in the spring and summer of 2002 to neutralize what was believed to be the world's largest anthrax dumping grounds. His team of 113 people neutralized between 100 and 200 tonnes of anthrax over a three-month period. The cost of the cleanup operation was approximately US$5 million.
