A film about the beginning of the construction of the Katunskaya hydroelectric power station, which can lead to an environmental disaster. Landscapes of the Katun River. Construction works. Local residents, writer Boris [Ukachin], construction foreman, fireman V. Kydyev talk about their attitude to construction (synchronously). Part 1 Rybinsk reservoir. HELL. Grishin talks about the consequences of the flooding of the Vesyegonskaya floodplain during the creation of the Rybinsk reservoir. The destroyed church building. Gorno-Altai Autonomous Region. Drawings of primitive people, carved on a stone lash. Stone women, preserved from the period of the Turkic Khaganate (6-8 centuries). Part 2 Aral Sea. Ships and abandoned ships among the sands. Children with physical disabilities in one of the orphanages in Kazakhstan. Gorno-Altai Autonomous Okrug. Pupils of the Kuyus eight-year school of the Shebalinsky district are playing in the school yard. The territory of the Chemal sanatorium for pulmonary patients.