In the 1910s, engineers proposed digging a canal from the Mediterranean Sea to the Qattara Depression in northwestern Egypt, flooding the below-sea-level basin to generate hydroelectric power. The plan was studied intermittently for more than a century before Egypt scrapped it this year.
According to a 1933 summary in Nature of surveyor John Ball's work, the Qattara Depression has an average floor depth of about 60 meters (200 feet) below sea level, with a maximum depth of roughly 133 meters. The basin spans an estimated 20,000 square kilometers (about 7,700 square miles). Since no rivers flow into it, the basin remains dry.
