North Crimean Canal

The North Crimean Canal, formerly known as the North Crimean Canal of Lenin's Komsomol of Ukraine in Soviet times, is a land improvement canal for irrigation and watering of Ukraine's Kherson Oblast and the Crimean Peninsula. The canal has multiple branches throughout Kherson Oblast and Crimea, and is normally active from March until December. Preparation for construction began in 1957, soon after the transfer of Crimea to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1954. The main project works took place in three stages between 1961 and 1971. The construction was conducted by the Komsomol members sent by the Komsomol travel ticket (Komsomolskaya putyovka) as part of shock construction projects and accounted for some 10,000 volunteer workers. Ukraine shut down the canal in 2014 soon after Russia annexed Crimea. Russia restored the flow of water in March 2022 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine. With the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam and its reservoir in 2023, however, the canal can no longer be supplied with water and became dry. A 2015 study found that the canal had been providing 85% of Crimea's water prior to the 2014 shutdown. Of the water from the canal, 72% went to agriculture and 10% to industry, while water for drinking and other public uses made up 18%.

Canal data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).