Right, Lake Sarez appears to be out of bounds. I don't want to get detained again so I think avoiding that region is a good idea. I can't find any info regarding getting the required permit to go there and I don't have the time to try and get one locally once in Tajikistan.

So, has anyone been PAST lake Sarez? How big is the exclusion zone? What about the road following the Bartang river from Rushan? Following this takes you past Lake Sarez, and then if you follow the Kudara River road to the north east you miss the lake by about 5km and you can join the M41. Is this wishful thinking?

- Hareti

Its is restricted area as before they had landslide and scientist think if second landslide happened then half Central Asia get washed away so its off limits

see below


Lake’s creation

Lake Sarez was created in 1911 when an enormous landslide caused by an earthquake in the Pamir Mountains of eastern Tajikistan buried Usoy village and blocked the Murgab River.

Within two years the river formed a lake about 60km long, containing close to 17 cubic kilometres of water. The natural dam, which retains the lake name, Usoy, lies at an altitude of 3,200 meters. At over 550 metres high and some 2km long, it is the tallest natural dam in the world.

''If Lake Sarez were to flood, the impact might be devastating''
Risks

The risks associated with Sarez lie in a potential landslide some 4km upstream, on the right bank of the lake. Some reports warn that, should a strong earthquake occur in the vicinity of the lake, roughly three cubic kilometres of material might fall into the lake.

Such an event could trigger an enormous wave, which would submerge the natural dam and possibly wash it away. Impact projections suggest the flood could affect roughly five million people living along the Bartang, Pyanj and Amu-Darya rivers, a path traversing Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan.

“If Lake Sarez were to flood, the impact might be devastating,” said Hadi Husani, acting mission head of FOCUS, a US-based humanitarian NGO.

Early warning system

Lake Sarez is monitored from a small facility near the dam that had a monitoring and early warning system installed in 2004. Parts of the monitoring system are used to raise the alarm and are integrated into an early warning system designed to alert villagers downstream of any disaster.

The local population have been trained in the early warning system and disaster preparedness programmes. Each district has established its own rapid response committee. Every village has its own emergency evacuation map. Safe assembly areas have also been identified.

“There are VHF radios in each community. In an emergency the community leader will tell the villages to evacuate. Evacuation zones are equipped with first aid kits,” said Husani.

In case of flooding, the first waves from the Sarez could reach the nearest village in 25 minutes, and the furthest place, districts bordering Uzbekistan, would be reached in 38 hours.

“Training and practice by the local population shows that the population of those villages can evacuate in 12 minutes, said Maskaev.
Even if you stop the oldest man working on his land in the area and ask him what happens if Lake Sarez floods, he will tell you the exact paths leading to a safe area and the time he has to make it there, Goulsara Pulatova, a senior adviser for UN/ISDR Central Asia, said in Dushanbe.
Most vulnerable

Twenty-eight villages in the Bartang valley and Rushan District of Gorno-Badakhshan in the east of the country have been identified as the most vulnerable if the lake were to flood. “Thus the population of these villages have been trained many times on the early warning practices,” Pulatova added.