Slashdot Mirror
Giant Crater Appears In Northern Siberia
New submitter DavidMZ writes: The Siberian Times reports on a large crater of unknown origin that has appeared in the Yamal Peninsula in northern Siberia. The Russian government has dispatched a group of scientists to investigate the 80-meter-wide crater. Anna Kurchatova from Siberia's Sub-Arctic Scientific Research Center believes the crater was a result of an explosion when a mixture of water, salt, and natural gas exploded underground. The Yamai Peninsula is known to hold Russia's biggest natural gas reserve."
Hmmm?
Wasn't there a movie about 10 or 20 years ago about a large crater appearing in the barren Eastern part of the USSR?
Melting permafrost.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Is this some "found footage" for a Core sequel or reboot?
Its the Yeti !
Where is the Doctor when we need him?
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Let me guess. The explosion was caught on a Russian dashcam, amirite?
"Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins
"it is believed to have been formed around two years ago"
1:4:9?
The worlds biggest natural gas reserve in D.C.
There are thousends upon thousends of similar holes (all filled with water) on Yamal peninsula. Many are few kilometers in diameter, most are smaller. This one may be new, but quite common in the area. Obviously it's due to gas eruptions of some kind. Landscape is like from the LOTR.
Explosive frackulence
That giant hole shows burn marks, people.... BURN MARKS!!!!
scary thought, but what if it is an entry point of a miniature black hole?
Giorgio A. Tsoukalos wants to know.
It is better to be the hammer than the anvil.
What does Jesus and postmen have in common?
This will be great for throwing dissidents in.
And kaabala will fly into the third
"Your precious moose...gratefully accepted!"
Is it "Yamal" or "Yamai"? I know the keys for these letters are near to each other on the keyboard, but surely you can pay someone to spend a few minutes proof-reading the copy before you post it?
Derweze they found large gas deposits, a crane collapsed on-site and caused a rush of natural gas to the surface. USSR scientists thought it was best to burn it to reduce the environmental impact. That was in 1971, it is still burning.
It hatched.
It looks pretty deep in the video. Do these holes go down to where the gas is? When they open up, does that whole part of the gas field empty into the atmosphere?
I know what's down there
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
..it's an Exogorth Lair!
Left MS Windows for Linux Mint and never looked back!
Vote for Bernie in 2016!
All Hail our Gopher Overlords!
// TODO: Add comments
First, if this is 80 meters in diameter, or 40 meters in radius, and say at a minimum 40 meters deep, that’ s not quite 10^9 kg of soil moved up order 40 meters, requiring (very roughly) the equivalent of 60 tons of TNT, at a minimum, and thus an equivalent magnitude of ~ 3.2 (again, roughly). Such an explosion should be detectable on seismological networks, such as the ones looking for nuclear testing.
Second, there is another mystery crater in Siberia - the Patomskiy crater. This one is in rock, not sediment, is about 160 meters in diameter, and is maybe 300 years old, but I have to wonder if they have a similar cause.
Third, I am interested in quark nuggets and other types of condensed matter, such as Q-Balls, generically called Compact UltraDense Objects (CUDOs) by Jan Rafelski of U. Arizona. If these things exist in the appropriate masses, they could cause holes such as this and the Patomskiy crater. Even better, if this were to be caused by transiting CUDO, it would cause a "linear earthquake, which should be easily recognizable in the seismic record.
Area locals reported what appeared to be a very shiny guy riding a very shiny flying surfboard in the vicinity.
Good bye I say. :)
There are lots of gas pockets in Siberian and under the polar seas that are locked by cold temperatures only. As warming increases, more and more of these will burst, accelerating climate change.
Scientists have been warning of these for many years. There has been lots of talks about a "tipping point" after which no reduction in man's greenhouse gas emissions would have any effect, when carbon levels in the atmosphere could increase because of cascading natural gas eruptions alone.
This is why it is so important to reduce carbon emissions.
"We mustn't be caught by surprise by our own advancing technology" -- Aldous Huxley
I'm pretty sure this new crater is just Nikola Tesla playing with his time machine again. After what he did to Tunguska, you'd think Russia would just ask him nicely to stay away or do his experiments in Canada or something.
Hell, he could do them in Alberta and nobody would notice if the whole province was sent 50 years back in time. Except the hockey players wouldn't be wearing helmets. They'd notice that right away.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The hole is about the right size for one of Dune's sandworms.
Maybe the meteor that hit last year, or another one we did not see, it could be Cthulhu but since there has not been a noticeable up tick in everyone is dead, I'm going with not
Yeah, totally obvious.
I'm guessing that less than 2% of you know probably what the heck I'm talking about here.
As someone said above, itÃs just permafrost melting. Yep, global Warming.
As if the loud (and completely unnecessary)noise of the helicopter on the video wasn't enough, did you have to keep it on the slowed down part of the video so that it sounds like the belching roar of Satan himself?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
We have large craters opening all the time in certain parts of Florida. Suddenly forming sink holes swallow people and homes in a single gulp. It seems that we have sucked so much water out of the ground that collapses occur suddenly. One poor guy went under with half of his home and it was deep enough that his body could not be retrieved. In effect the man fell into hell on his own bed.
"large enough for several Mi-8 helicopters to fly into it - not that they have."
"the dark colour of the crater indicates 'some temperature processes', without explaining more what they may mean"
" it could be caused by a space object - perhaps a meteorite...We can definitely say that it is not a meteorite. No details yet,"
"one web claim suggested - evidence 'of the arrival of a UFO craft' to the planet."
That's some quality journalism right there.
It was a joke that got out of hand.
Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
An enormous hole had been made by the impact of the projectile, and the sand and gravel had been flung violently in every direction over the heath, forming heaps visible a mile and a half away. The heather was on fire eastward, and a thin blue smoke rose against the dawn. Link here (e.g.)