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Drilling Might Be Getting a Bad Rap For Indonesia's Ongoing "Mud Volcano"

Posted by timothy on from the make-up-your-mind-son-it-is-mud-or-is-a-volcano? dept.

davide-nature writes "The freakish event has been blamed on a company that was drilling for natural gas nearby. But scientists have found a rock formation deep below the surface and shaped like a parabolic antenna. It could have focused seismic waves from an earthquake that occurred shortly before the eruption, and onto a clay layer. The clay then liquefied and somehow found its way to the surface."

24 of 31 comments (clear)

  1. A multiple oddity? by GeekWithAKnife · · Score: 1


    This can explain the event; a multiple oddity. You know, when singular oddities gang up on you.

    Or maybe the drilling had something to do with it...with that rock formation and all that.

    --
    A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
    1. Re:A multiple oddity? by g0bshiTe · · Score: 2

      If it was due to the drilling which is a common belief, no data to back it up as opposed to studies to disprove it was the drilling then for it to have lasted as long as it had I think more was at work here than just the drilling. It began in 2006 and continues.

      --
      I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
    2. Re:A multiple oddity? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Is your comment supposed to be in English?

    3. Re:A multiple oddity? by g0bshiTe · · Score: 3, Funny

      It was meant to be SMS text but my spelling is off.

      --
      I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
    4. Re:A multiple oddity? by pastafazou · · Score: 2

      not sure why someone marked your post as a troll, I couldn't make any sense of what g0bshiTe was trying to say either without rereading it twice!

    5. Re:A multiple oddity? by GeekWithAKnife · · Score: 1

      After I translated his original post to SMS text it made perfect sense.

      --
      A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
    6. Re:A multiple oddity? by g0bshiTe · · Score: 1

      Yeah, I have to apologize after I had posted it I realized that apparently "coherent thought" and writing didn't go together in that post.

      --
      I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
  2. For more information. by PlusFiveTroll · · Score: 4, Informative

    There is a very long Wikipedia article on this topic that contains a great deal of information on what occurred. While a great deal of work has been done to show that it is not fully the oil companies fault, drilling in to a hydrothermically unstable area with a faulty well design is a recipe for disaster.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidoarjo_mud_flow

    1. Re:For more information. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      So you're argument is that it's still the oil company's fault since they were in the area? It doesn't matter that what they were doing could have caused a problem since it didn't cause the problem.

    2. Re:For more information. by Joining+Yet+Again · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Finding evidence of one contributory factor is not the same as disproving all other factors.

    3. Re:For more information. by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      Factors which are little more than guesses.

      However, you and your cronies can't sue a parabolic rock formation, nor can you stand there and promise the electorate you will beat the head of it if'n only they'd elect you.

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    4. Re:For more information. by Joining+Yet+Again · · Score: 1

      Me and my cronies? Whatever you're reading into my post, it's not there.

    5. Re:For more information. by drainbramage · · Score: 1

      Thank you so much Erin Brokavich.

      --
      No brain, no pain.
  3. uh oh by slashmydots · · Score: 1

    After Sharnado I don't think the Sci Fi needs any ideas like Mud Volcano for their next movie. Hopefully none of them read Slashdot.

  4. Not the only mud volcano by flyingfsck · · Score: 4, Informative

    This isn't the only mud vent in Indonesia and the others were not caused by drilling either.

    --
    Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
    1. Re:Not the only mud volcano by flyingfsck · · Score: 3, Informative

      A link to a very nice site about mud volcanoes: http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mud-volcanoes-of-azerbaijan

      --
      Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
    2. Re:Not the only mud volcano by flyingfsck · · Score: 1

      also in the USA at the Salton Sea salt lake: http://www.yelp.com/biz/salton-sea-mud-pots-and-geothermal-mud-volcanoes-calipatria

      --
      Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
  5. Does not seem very plausible by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    There are earthquakes *all* the time in Indonesia, and mud volcanoes are known across many parts of Indonesia. Why would it pick this earthquake (275km away) at this moment to fail, within a short distance (200 metres) from a borehole that was in progress and which was penetrating high fluid pressure zones at depth? It's an awful coincidence. Why here?

    B) best case, these guys drilled into a structure that was "ready to blow". That's a bad move potentially leading to disaster regardless.

    C) I'm a little surprised this made it into Nature Geoscience.

  6. Tagline by OptimalCynic · · Score: 1

    "from the make-up-your-mind-son-it-is-mud-or-is-a-volcano? dept." I think we have a winner for the "most ignorant tagline" dept.

  7. How wrong. by Type44Q · · Score: 2

    Drilling Might Be Getting a Bad Rap For Indonesia's Ongoing "Mud Volcano"

    That is simply no way to refer to tubgirl.

  8. Re:One flaw with that argument... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    The article explains that the mud greased a fault that slipped and connected the mud to pre-existing hydrothermal tubes that allowed it to spurt to the surface.

  9. Here it is on Google Maps by turp182 · · Score: 1

    It doesn't look as bad as it was in 2007 (read the article, looked at the photo...).

    https://maps.google.com/maps?q=Sidoarjo,+East+Java,+Indonesia&hl=en&ll=-7.528426,112.710285&spn=0.14091,0.264187&sll=32.576226,-86.680736&sspn=7.662306,16.907959&oq=Sidoarjo,+in&hnear=Sidoarjo,+East+Java,+Republic+of+Indonesia&t=h&z=13

    The mud area is about 1 mile square (or 1.8KM guesstimating from the legend).

    --
    BlameBillCosby.com
  10. Re:One flaw with that argument... by jittles · · Score: 1

    Not their fault? BS. They didn't make the mud, but they sure as hell made the tube it used to get above-ground.

    To be clear, the mud did not spew out of the bore hole from the drilling. So whether or not the drilling caused the mud to be created, or whether it in any way contributed to the problem, the drilling itself did not create the hole used by the mud to escape. While you might argue that the drilling caused the event that created the escape path, it was a secondary event to the drilling itself.

  11. Re:One flaw with that argument... by iggymanz · · Score: 1

    Indonesia is the land of mud volcanoes

    the mud did NOT come up the borehole they made

    may as well blame any nearby lightening strikes on the drilling