12 Natural Wonders That Don’t Exist Anymore (2 of 7)

Lake Poopó (Bolivia)

Once one of the largest high-altitude lakes in the world, Lake Poopó stretched over 390 square miles, even though it was basically a shallow mega-puddle about 10 feet deep at most. In 2015, a combo of irrigation use, climate change, and glacial melt caused it to vanish entirely. Along with the water went countless fish, birds, and the livelihoods of locals who had depended on it.

Sequoia Tunnel Tree (California, USA)

Giant sequoias are already the skyscrapers of the forest, so in the 1800s and early 1900s, people decided to make them even more of a spectacle by carving car-sized tunnels right through them. The most famous was in Calaveras Big Trees State Park, a 1,000-year-old behemoth that drew tourists for decades. But in 2017, a storm finally toppled it. Turns out, cutting a massive hole in a tree’s base isn’t great for its health.