$1 Billion Mission To Reach the Earth's Mantle

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$1 Billion Mission To Reach the Earth's Mantle

Posted by timothy on Tuesday October 2, 2012 @01:37AM from the because-it's-the-closest-one dept.

black6host writes "Humans have reached the moon and are planning to return samples from Mars, but when it comes to exploring the land deep beneath our feet, we have only scratched the surface of our planet. This may be about to change with a $1 billion mission to drill 6 km (3.7 miles) beneath the seafloor to reach the Earth's mantle — a 3000 km-thick layer of slowly deforming rock between the crust and the core which makes up the majority of our planet — and bring back the first ever fresh samples."

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Paging Lawrence Fishburn by DaKong · 2012-10-02 01:38 · Score: 5, Funny

Please remember to wear your heat suit when venturing outside the vessel.

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If not us, who? If not now, when?
1. Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn by MiniMike · 2012-10-02 01:56 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Because it's too easy? It's like picking on a disabled kid- it would be easy, but it's just wrong to do.
  Because it's too cheesy? Some movies approach the cheesiness boundary carefully, but don't get too close. This one seemed to leap over that line early in the movie, and just kept running for the fence.
  But mostly:
  Because one would have to admit having seen The Core?
2. Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn by beamdriver · 2012-10-02 02:02 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  Because The Core is a fun, silly movie meant to be enjoyed with your brain in the off position.
  I particularly liked the part when they got stuck in a giant geode. The only way it could have been better would have been if there were dinosaurs in the geode.
3. Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn by FreonTrip · 2012-10-02 02:16 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  That wasn't Lawrence Fishburne, that was Delroy Lindo. And yes, The Core is one of the most hideously inaccurate, ostensibly scientific films ever made. What galls is that the film itself isn't awful in terms of character development or plotting - it's just oriented around a series of terribly wrong fundamental assumptions, and then ties itself into progressively more ridiculous knots to support them.
  On the other hand, it is riotously funny to watch with a room full of tipsy geologists.
4. Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn by SilentStaid · 2012-10-02 02:26 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  On the other hand, it is riotously funny to watch with a room full of tipsy geologists.
  The problem with that is they won't shut up about how much the floor is tilting or the world is spinning... and drinking just makes it worse.
  
  /ducks
5. Re:Paging Lawrence Fishburn by Alsee · 2012-10-02 03:09 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  How about just one dinosaur was trapped in the geode, and for the last 65 million years evolution has been turning it into an even more ferocious and deadly killing machine.
  P.S. Before anyone corrects me on evolution, I am mocking the general level of scientific accuracy of the movie.
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  - - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Sounds fun. by Sparticus789 · 2012-10-02 01:40 · Score: 5, Funny

I wonder if by samples, they mean the live dinosaurs that inhabit hollow earth.

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sudo make me a sandwich
Why do we have to dig our own hole? by UnresolvedExternal · 2012-10-02 01:43 · Score: 4, Interesting

Forgive my ignorance here but don't we already have this? What's wrong with using a volcano?
1. Re:Why do we have to dig our own hole? by dywolf · 2012-10-02 02:46 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Because a volcano isnt a straight shot. Know how water flows through rock via the cracks and fissures? Same thing with a volcano, just molten rock instead of water as the fluid.
  
  --
  The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
2. Re:Why do we have to dig our own hole? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-10-02 04:13 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  And here I thought it would drain the whole ocean.
We must stop them! by nysus · 2012-10-02 01:45 · Score: 5, Funny

I know how this ends...with a giant sucking sound as the world's oceans drain into the earth's core. Then, as steam builds inside the planet, the earth turns into a giant exploding kernel of popcorn.

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---Technology will liberate us if it doesn't enslave us first.
1. Re:We must stop them! by lordofthechia · 2012-10-02 03:06 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  I know how this ends...with a giant sucking sound as the world's oceans drain into the earth's core. Then,
  The whole world gets covered in a thick layer of steam. For weeks it becomes hard to breath and see. After the steam subsides people start to wipe their fogged up windows to reveal every TV screen, every computer screen, every phone and tablet with the same message:
  STEAM: NOW AVAILABLE ON ALL PLATFORMS
  
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  Georgia Tech, the leader in Chia(tm) technology.
Obligatory movie quotes by zill · 2012-10-02 02:09 · Score: 4, Informative

The humans delved too greedily and too deep. You know what they awoke in the darkness of Khazad-dum... shadow and flame.
Diamond juice by Lev13than · 2012-10-02 02:10 · Score: 5, Interesting

"Down there," said Golg, "I could show you real gold, real silver, real diamonds."
"Bosh!" said Jill rudely. "As if we didn't know that we're below the deepest mines even here."
"Yes," said Golg. "I have heard of those little scratches in the crust that you Topdwellers call mines. But
that's where you get dead gold, dead silver, dead gems. Down in Bism we have them alive and growing.
There I'll pick you bunches of rubies that you can eat and squeeze you a cup full of diamond-juice. You
won't care much about fingering the cold, dead treasures of your shallow mines after you have tasted the
live ones of Bism."
"My father went to the world's end," said Rilian thoughtfully. "It would be a marvellous thing if his son
went to the bottom of the world."

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When you have nothing left to burn you must set yourself on fire
Was Lake Peigneur just a small proof of concept? by Kaptain+Kruton · 2012-10-02 03:00 · Score: 4, Interesting

I know it isn't going to happen like this, but I cannot help but think of the flooded salt mine on Lake Peigneur. Some drillers miscalculated their location and drilled down, through a lake bed, into a nearby salt mine shaft. The lake was drained and temporarily reversed the flow of nearby rivers. Look it up on youtube... its kind of interesting to hear how a relatively small 14 inch drill bit can cause a disaster large enough to sink multiple barges and reverse rivers.
Re:Balloon by JazzLad · 2012-10-02 04:31 · Score: 4, Funny

This is why we're doing it under the ocean.

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"If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." - Every fascist, ever