back to article MYSTERIOUS Siberia CRATER: ALIENS or METEOR not involved, officials insist

A huge, enigmatic crater which has suddenly appeared in a remote region of Siberia was definitely not caused by an unidentified object falling from space, the Russian authorities insist. The mysterious crater seen from a passing helicopter. Credit: Konstantin Nikolaev "We can definitely say that it is not a meteorite. No …

  1. WibbleMe

    Its a cover-up they have been breeding giant gofers

    1. Robert Helpmann??
      Childcatcher

      Giant Gofers

      Mole Men!

      Looks suspiciously like a sink hole. What could the government possibly be hiding down there? Dirt? Water? An underground civilization? (˙ǝuo ʇsɐl ǝɥʇ ʇoN :∀)

      1. John Riddoch

        Re: Giant Gofers

        Sinkhole was my first thought, but that doesn't account for the debris round the hole. The idea of some trapped gas underground exploding makes more sense, it would explain the debris round the hole and its depth.

        Certainly it doesn't look like a normal impact crater, it's too deep for that.

        1. Marshalltown

          Re: Giant Gofers

          Many, many moons ago folks thought that the bones of mammoth were the remains of giant burrowing animals. Apparently that was the rationale for why all mammoth bones were found in burial contexts.

        2. itzman

          Re: Giant Gofers

          Looks to me like what you get when a supersonic bomb impacts but does not detonate. I.e. a pure vertical impact crater ..

          1. cordwainer 1

            Re: Giant Gofers

            Alien Whack-A-Mole? Waiting for the next hole to appear....

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Giant Gofers

            That was my first thought as well (hypersonic penetrator) and haven't seen anything yet to differ. The bottom profile is what's need now.

            [Maybe a "Get Real" postcard from Obama to Putin, only called to his attention recently now that it's required?]

            1. mrjobby
              Paris Hilton

              Re: Giant Gofers

              "hypersonic penetrator" - fnarr!

          3. John X Public
            Mushroom

            Re: Giant Gofers

            " I.e. a pure vertical impact crater "

            Ooo, sub-orbital kinetic weapons, my favorite. After moonbase railguns.

        3. Otto is a bear.

          Re: Giant Gofers

          Doesn't look as it it were that powerful an explosion either, the ejecta doesn't seem to have strayed to far from the hole, though not a good photograph to tell. It's much too vertical for an impact crater, so venting gas is the most logical explanation.

    2. AndrueC Silver badge
      Facepalm

      Its a cover-up they have been breeding giant gofers

      I briefly mis-read that as giant golfers.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        "Its a cover-up they have been breeding giant gofers

        I briefly mis-read that as giant golfers."

        Maybe some mad Russian scientist is a fan of Caddyshack.

        1. Scott 1
          Coat

          Giant golfer? Not likely.

          A giant golfer's divot would probably result in a shallower depression with a soil/debris spread generally in only one direction.

          Now, they may have been creating a hole for a game of giant *golf*, but that wouldn't necessarily involve giant golfers.

          1. zen1

            Re: Giant golfer? Not likely.

            Scott,

            You've never seen me golf... Put me in the rough and I can have a have a mini strip mine in a matter of a few minutes. They should have named that game "damn it" instead of golf

            1. AndrueC Silver badge
              Unhappy

              Re: Giant golfer? Not likely.

              You've never seen me golf

              You, I might have seen. My ball in the rough on the other hand..natch. I play either bright yellow or bright orange and still the buggers can vanish without trace barely an inch off the fairway.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Ah Caddyshack

        - I want you to kill every gopher on the course!

        - Correct me if I am wrong sir, but if I kill all the golfers, they are going to lock me up and throw away the key!

    3. This post has been deleted by its author

  2. poopypants

    It's obvious

    Gaia squeezed a pimple.

  3. Spotfist

    I would check for Mynock's before going inside.

    1. Rich 11

      Do you mean Morlocks?

      1. Tom 13

        Too be on the safe side, check for both. And er, molemen too.

        1. cordwainer 1

          Mynocks, Morlocks and Molemen...

          would be a great song title

      2. Spotfist

        Now you're just being silly! Morlocks are a fictional made up creature

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morlock

        Whereas Mynoks are real.

        http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Mynock

        1. Eltonga
          Childcatcher

          Gentlemen, check your references please.

          We are discussing what seems to be a Sarlacc.

          http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Sarlacc

          Shame on you for spreading fake knowledge around!!!

  4. Captain Scarlet Silver badge
    Coffee/keyboard

    To the Russian Death Crash Videos

    They hold the truth (As well as tonnes of crashes).

    Of course other Crash related videos are available on the internet.

  5. myhandler

    Um - nothing to say or show how big it actually is?

    10 metres wide ? 100?

    Needs a yak herder peering in to give scale.

    1. Julz

      These a fair amount of data here:

      http://siberiantimes.com/science/casestudy/news/first-pictures-from-inside-the-crater-at-the-end-of-the-world/

      Reminds me of an Edward De Bono lateral thought problem. My first stab would be a plug of ice forced up through the soil; possibly by gas pressure.

      p.s. If you look at the the final video you can see a number of small circular lakes as the helicopter comes to land which could be holes like this one but eroded and filled with water over a period of time.

    2. Marshalltown
      Devil

      Size

      The pilot and passenger who originally found it estimated a diameter of 870 meters. As to cause, were I to speculate I would suggest pressurized methane beneath permafrost, with failure when pressure exceeded the strength of the permafrost. You can pick either melting permafrost or increasing methane and keep both sides of the GW debate happy.

      1. Anonymaus Cowark

        Re: Size

        A burst methan bubble was my first thought as well.

        but I could only imagine this as a result of the global warming ...

  6. ElReg!comments!Pierre
    Pint

    It doesn't take a rocket scientist...

    ... to conclude that it is really an alien spacecraft crash site.

    Or, it really takes not a rocket scientist to conclude that this is an alien spacecraft crash site.

    Same words, slightly different order, take your pick!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: It doesn't take a rocket scientist...

      It wasn't a crash. Tunguska was the crash as they arrived. This was a take-off as they departed from their underground base.

      1. Martin Budden Silver badge
        Alien

        Re: It doesn't take a rocket scientist...

        It looks like something of alien origin burst out of the ground. What we need to do next is search the opposite side of the planet for the entry wound.

        It was either this icon or Joke Alert, take your pick.

  7. pigor

    Shai-Hulud of the tundra?

    1. Munchausen's proxy
      Pint

      Shai-Hulud of the tundra?

      I was going to go with Sarlacc, but I like yours better. Now I have a vision of an internet meme of Putin riding the sandworm.

      1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
        Devil

        Re: Shai-Hulud of the tundra?

        JIHAD!!!!

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Pint

        Re: Shai-Hulud of the tundra?

        Thanks a lot. Now I'm stuck with the image of a bare-chested Vladimir Putin riding a sandworm across the muskeg.

        Well, it gives me an excuse to head off to the local watering hole to drown those pesky neurons.

  8. Trollslayer
    Devil

    Aliens?

    They have better sense than bother with the kind of people who think aliens would bother.

    1. Sir Runcible Spoon
      Trollface

      Re: Aliens?

      We have nothing to hide from Aliens, therefore nothing to fear..right?

  9. Perpetual Cyclist

    A bit of a clue - it is less than 20 miles from a major gas drilling site. I don't know if they employ fracking. If you look at a wider view of the site, for example on google earth, it looks like a moonscape of cratered permafrost.

    Explosive release of methane expelled from methane hydrates or melting permafrost, as a result of high summer temperatures. Possibly, build-up of gas seeping from lower level gas deposits trapped under the surface layer of permafrost, erupting like a gas geyser.

    Consistent with, but not proof of, global climate change.

    1. envmod

      you're very obviously one of them.

      1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
        Alien

        envmod? Mister David Vincent, I presume?

        "On peut vous aider?"

    2. Don Jefe

      This big fucking hole is consistent with a big fucking hole. That much is certain. Beyond that it's consistent with a lot of things.

      A big hole like this is consistent with, but not proof of, the Ninth Seal of Y'Gloth being washed in the menstrual blood of a virgin Laplander born under a Sulphur Moon as the final element in awakening Cthulhu, Lord of Silence, to rend in twain the Angelic Gates imprisoning Leviathan and begin the March of 'The Not'.

      The big hole is certainly interesting, but you're melding a number of issues together and causing you unnecessary concern, and leading your thoughts in the wrong direction. Regardless of your beliefs/feelings/happy ignorance, you're doing yourself, and others, a disservice with crazy talk. There are a lot of questions and concerns about fracking, there's no doubt. As it stands right now I have declined to lease my property in Western Pennsylvania because as an Engineer I'm not satisfied with the information that's presently available. I'm not saying anything beyond I want to know more. It's far too early for anyone to have valid information regarding the mega-fracking projects. This is a time for watching, not acting.

      But when you pop off with factually limited commentary like that you're giving the 'other side' ammunition; that's pretty dumb. You can't draw corollaries between the pockmarked surface and the Big Hole. The not Big Hole and other undulations in the permafrost are a natural function of permafrost. It looks solid and it feels solid (and cold) but it's actually a very delicate thing that a few research projects I'm aware of are studying permafrost as a model in chaotic numbers theories.

      Permafrost is kind of like a box packing peanuts. It fills a void, but is not very dense. Permafrost is a lattice work of solids like rocks and dirt with the spaces in between filled with ice. Natural disturbances in the Earth (tectonic movements for example) don't have to be strong enough to move the solids in the lattice, just disturb the ice enough to allow some solids to move. Gravity, being impervious to the cold, still works though, so the solids drop onto solids below and that chain reaction occurs until the solids encounter a space where the lattice can support the new solids.

      Less common, but extra cool, is ice 'lensing' where, for example, a rock on the surface is heated sufficiently by the Sun to partially melt the snow and ice it is resting on (it really doesn't take much) and a sudden temperature drop (very common) 'flash freezes' the melted snow/ice. It can create a surprisingly clear lens that let's sunlight beneath the surface of the snow/ice. The resultant heat is then trapped in a very well insulated place thus being much more efficient at melting the ice above, and below. My previous paragraph deals with how the liberated solids behave.*

      Incidentally, risks of melting the ice in the permafrost lattice is why buildings down in the Tundra and Steppe are built on stilts and, in big structures, air is pumped out from the underside of the buildings. The air trapped beneath an insulated building is more than sufficient to change an above grade building into a below grade bunker very quickly.

      If you're interested in something neat, check out the heat pipes that support the Alyeska Pipeline in Alaska. There's something like 125,000 of those posts that support the pipeline. They transfer ground heat into the air to prevent it from destabilizing the permafrost and causing the pipeline to collapse. It's really cool.

      Anyway, my point wasn't to be a dick (hope I didn't come off as one). I just thought it was important you knew that disturbances in permafrost are common, varied, and sometimes (like with the Big Hole) really bizarre. Jumping straight to a commercial culprit (any culprit beyond 'nature' really) without understanding other naturally occurring possibilities first isn't ever going to result in factual answers (factual being, I assume, what you prefer).

      *That lensing effect I mentioned earlier is a very, very cool thing. When we still had a field office in Dead Horse, Alaska the phenomenon would sometimes occur when exhaust from a piece of equipment left idling would partially thaw the ice and would instantly freeze again when the equipment was moved. It sometimes created a startlingly clear window through the ice. Sometimes even far enough down to see the road we drove on in the summer. Very cool.

      1. Sean Timarco Baggaley

        Pfft! Facts!

        You can prove anything with facts!

        I find your lack of faith in the competence of national governments to maintain alien conspiracies for generations... well, not really all that disturbing, now that I think of it.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "Consistent with, but not proof of, global climate change."

      Strange thing to say when AGW has been proved beyond credible scientific doubt to be happening for well over a decade now.

  10. Mystic Megabyte
    Happy

    It's the lair of the white worm

    Send in the boy scouts!

    For the younger readers this film contains one of the funniest sex scenes ever filmed.

    http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095488/?ref_=nv_sr_1

    1. skeptical i
      Devil

      Welcome to my underground lair.

      The Pacific volcano lair is being remodeled with upgraded shark tanks and other evil accoutrements, so we relocated to the Siberian summer lair for the duration.

    2. cortland

      Re: It's the lair of the white worm

      Sex scene? Oh, WHERE's Dabbs when you need him?

  11. earl grey
    Joke

    reminds me

    Of a movie i just watched.

  12. Jefe Mixtli

    Pingo!!

    What they are almost certainly seeing is a melted PINGO. In areas of permafrost (like most of Canada) the ice underground can form hills up to a 1000ft high. They are basically a big chunk of ice covered in soil.

    If the temperature in the are warms enough, the ice melt and you end up with a crater full of water. You can see an almost identical feature here:

    http://icecubicle.net/2010/03/24/phenom-pingos-of-the-far-north/

    http://icecubicle.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/pingo-ice-lens-shattered.jpg

    1. Nigel 11
      Coat

      Re: Pingo!!

      a melted PINGO

      that'll be a pingone, then.

    2. This post has been deleted by its author

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Pingo!!

        Are you sure it is ejecta? If it was a collapsed pingo, is it possible that there may be collapse both in and out as the collapse happened. I imagine it would be a pretty unstable and unpredictable process taking an unknown length of time. Could be dramatic in seconds, or could take days as a gradual slump with rocks rolling all over the shop. As to vegetation, it takes a while for vegetation to colonise the ground exposed by the collapse/explosion.

  13. Semaj
    Alien

    Well no, obviously the spaceship didn't CRASH there - it was underground and took off.

  14. russell 6

    Boring answer

    Could it be a collapsed Pingo? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pingo

    The area is full of them. Not sure of the underlying geology in that neck of the woods but if it is a limestone area and the permafrost has been gradually melting, it would eat away at the rock under the iceplug. Could have caused the Pingo to collapse in on itself, creating a giant borehole at the same time. Any takers?

  15. aregross

    Gamma Ray Burst?

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

      The mark of a primitive weapon.

  16. Haynomonous

    Great Old Ones incoming

    Blame Cthulu.

    1. Toltec

      Re: Great Old Ones incoming

      Deep Seven?

      I wonder if the Laundry are on the case?

    2. Don Jefe

      Re: Great Old Ones incoming

      Worship Cthulhu. Make sacrifice unto Cthulhu. Venerate Cthulhu. Obey Cthulhu. Fear Cthulhu. Give unto Cthulhu willingly and long for the eternal silence and peace to be found in the darkness of His eternal embrace.

      Do not blame, accuse, doubt Cthulhu. Seek not to chastise Cthulhu. Lest yours will be the eternal screaming of your soul and the reek of the burning flesh from all you know and love. Yea, transgress not against The Child of Light and Father of Despair would ye hope for peace eternal when the rude clay imprisoning your True Being is destroyed.

  17. envmod

    AVP

    Looks suspiciously like the hole down into the ice made by the Predators in AVP if you ask me.

  18. James Boag
    Joke

    Can't believe you guys missed it !

    Large hole appears, The authorities are looking into it !

    1. itzman
      Joke

      Re: Can't believe you guys missed it !

      3 holes in the ground?

      Well, well, well!

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It's a giant, horny, interplanetary moon that hasn't had any action for over a million years. Earth, lie back and think of England!

  20. This post has been deleted by its author

  21. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Pingo

    is gud cos I lern new word, pingo.

    intenetz is ful ov good knoledge.

    1. ravenviz Silver badge
      Pirate

      Re: Pingo

      I'm thinking of getting a tattoo!

  22. sandman

    I've read about these...

    Siberian Death Worm

    1. Tom 7

      Re: I've read about these...

      That must have been on motherfucker bottle of tequila then!

  23. Fink-Nottle

    Chaos!

    The Russians have found out how to grow Mandelbrot sets.

  24. Rocksalt
    WTF?

    Not an explosion

    if you look at the picture carefully and take a minute to think what physical process might have been in play to cause the cratering of this, plus the depth of the whole, plus the fact that there is little ejecta around the outside of the crater.... this is either a slow drill hole or something else that has physically bored its way in from a vertical position.. that's up and down to you rednecks :P

    the second picture shows inside the shaft... it looks pretty smooth, to a uniform tooth has chewed away from vertical up heading down, although the hole doesn't look uniformly circular that might be due to angle, light and camera...

    Note the blacked inner portion of the crater prime... the gradient colours from inside ( dark black ) to outside to crate walls ( light cream coloured) this show that something bored down and ejected up in a screw fashion internal debris... however, the colours do not match ( maybe dryness or moisture content issues here ?) it looks like the rock/soil was subjected to some heat AFTER the crater was formed, not at the point of penetration.

    Anyone got any ideas ?

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

      Re: Not an explosion

      Yep. Read "The Forge Of God"

      It begins!

    2. Charles Manning

      Re: Not an explosion

      >Anyone got any ideas ?

      The Russians think it has been there for 2 years, so it is feasible that other ejecta has been eroded/disolved.

      It is also feasible that this is a sink hole and the crud around the side is due to materials that have precipitated over the last two years (eg. gases coming out, reacing with the air/water and precipitating.).

      Not sure I but the explosion theory.

  25. sjsmoto

    Putin's return route?

    Perhaps those below even think he's gone too far and they're calling him home.

  26. Mark 85

    Wormhole?

    The spice must flow, afterall.

  27. LucreLout
    Holmes

    Quite obviously this is where Superman crashlanded.

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    You mean to tell me...

    ...nobody got caught this thing forming on their dash cam?

  29. Rocksalt

    nope.. your all wrong... its Cross rail gone and taken a left at kings cross

  30. Gotcha Lookin

    Gas buildup might explain the Noatak, Alaska, quake storm ...

    Take a look at the USGS earthquake archive for July 17-18, 2014: Noatak, Alaska, located at 67°34′19″N 162°58′30″W, is under siege this Summer from low-to-moderate magnitude quake storms. Methane gas build-up and release might explain this Summer's high frequency of low magnitude quakes in the warming Arctic tundra region. That, or a lot of MUTOs with very big claws. Or, more likely, wild cat oil and gas drillers working for BP.

    3.0 34km ENE of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-18 08:12:02 UTC-04:00 10.8 km

    4.6 49km ENE of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-18 01:33:25 UTC-04:00 5.0 km

    3.4 45km E of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-18 01:30:01 UTC-04:00 16.5 km

    3.7 41km E of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-18 00:31:53 UTC-04:00 21.7 km

    3.3 54km E of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-18 00:29:35 UTC-04:00 6.4 km

    3.7 44km ENE of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-17 23:42:36 UTC-04:00 16.5 km

    3.0 55km E of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-17 22:29:24 UTC-04:00 7.1 km

    4.1 46km ENE of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-17 22:01:45 UTC-04:00 15.2 km

    4.2 34km E of Noatak, Alaska 2014-07-17 22:00:45 UTC-04:00 10.0 km

  31. WillyDee

    The Beginning of the Beginning

    It was obviously created by a giant mole mutated by the Chernobyl nuclear reactor meltdown and subsequent radioactive contamination across Russia and the rest of the world. You can't say I didn't warn you that this would happen. And this is just the beginning.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge
      Windows

      Re: The Beginning of the Beginning

      Yeah, but frankly, I don't care anymore.

      I will be sitting on the front porch with my dog, drinking beer and observing the neighbors.

  32. Scroticus Canis
    Alien

    Argh, no - Galactus is coming!

    That Surfer dude must have made the hole.

  33. chris lively

    What does "huge" mean?

    If you guys are going to use words like "huge", it would be nice if that was quantified using a known reference.

    Are you talking like 1 meter or 300 meters across?

    1. Mage Silver badge

      Re: What does "huge" mean?

      Over 800 metres diameter I think.

      I'd call that huge.

      Not sure how deep. Don't knock the bucket in, just in case!

      1. Jos

        Re: What does "huge" mean?

        From the link posted earlier:

        'If we try to measure diameter together with soil emission, the so-called parapet, then the diameter is up to sixty meters.

        'The crater is from 50 to 70 metres deep'.

        Reposting: http://siberiantimes.com/science/casestudy/news/first-pictures-from-inside-the-crater-at-the-end-of-the-world/

  34. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Someone say hole?

    Norks got lost. This is what happens when you ban any technology that pre-dates the golden age of musicals. If you put your ear to the hole, you can hear praise being offered to the Dear Leader and demands to keep digging west.

  35. WibbleMe

    Anyone remember that movie Tremors with those prehistoric worm like creatures

  36. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    Don't you see it's the romulans?

    Big crater made with planetary-sized drill. Next thing we know we will implode in a red matter generated black hole.

  37. Anonymous Coward
    Boffin

    It's global warming alright!!

    Obviously, warming permafrost has allowed the thawing of an ancient, frozen giganto-gopher!

    Either that, or the Silver Surfer is tenderizing Earth in advance of Galactus' snack-time.

    1. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

      Re: It's global warming alright!!

      Earth is actually Kobe Beef?

  38. Bob Sanders

    Mario? Lugi?

    Looks like they found a old warp pipe

  39. I. Aproveofitspendingonspecificprojects

    Sinkholes and the AAO

    It appears that these phenomena go hand in hand with periods of enhanced phreatic activity earthwide.

  40. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    I'm surprised...

    Nobody mentioned Torchwood yet...

    //Looks like it's drilled by a laser...

  41. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Re. Siberian Death Worm

    Maybe it was actually made by a black hole?

    Just saying, a small BH would cause a sizable crater and if the entry point was in the ocean (likely) then we might not have seen it.

    Mini BHs have been seen on global seismic data before as synchronous quakes and the event horizon might have been displaced into a disk due to subterranean mirror matter from the Tunguska event.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Re. Siberian Death Worm

      I somehow missed your part about black holes and focused on small BH and mini BH. Must be my lunch beer.

      Black hole somehow fits the bill too.

  42. MatsSvensson

    Where they keep Putin's soul

    Welcome to Siberia, location of earth's butthole!

    Siberia, the place where the sun doesn't shine.

    Siberia, first home of the Large Hadron Collider.

    Friends help you move - Siberia helps you get rid of bodies.

  43. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Angel

    Sorry guys

    It was me. I was going for the record baking giant rock cakes, and dropped one.

  44. LynxO

    It's glory hole for giants.

  45. Cynicalmark

    Send in the Laundry

    Someone probably had their camera on Baselisk setting by mistake hehehe

  46. DropBear

    It's quite obvious what caused it...

    One word: ROCKFISH...

  47. willi0000000

    it's obviously the Tibetters.

    [H/T to Sir Pterry and Neil]

  48. Wzrd1 Silver badge

    OK, reality check here

    In my first three minutes of research, upon learning of this recent hole in the ground, I learned some interesting facts.

    First, it's a near-permafrost area. Near, not permafrost.

    Second, it's an area with a decent amount of water in the ground and soil.

    Third, the area is lousy with natural gas.

    Fourth, the area is lousy with shallow methane deposits from decompsition.

    Add point three and four together, as natural gas and methane are pretty much the same thing (there's some very modest differences, but it's in dilutant gasses for the most part, isotopes being the larger part).

    What one geologist suggested seems likely.

    A methane bubble formed long ago. Ice and water did their thing, melting ice freed its "cap" and let it vent as a big bubble of fart gas from hell.

    The rest is "mystery".

    There's no hint of conflgration. There's no hint of detonation. There's less than no hint of impact, vaporization, photon torpedoes, phasers, disruptors or anything else mythical.

    Only earth tossed about by modest pressure and nothing heated/burned.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: OK, reality check here

      Jack Hoffman and Dakota Fred trying for another Discovery channel episode of failure?

  49. Richard Cranium

    Some uneducated reasoning...

    The ejected waste we can see looks far less than the volume of the hole.

    The distribution of the waste doesn't look much like that left over from an explosion, it's all very close to the hole. So try this for a hypothesis:

    Forget about explosions, a relatively slow acting underground force has forced a body of ice to move upwards pushing aside the topsoil. Once exposed to warmer temperature the ice has melted leaving the lake at the bottom (and doubtless some water escaped hence the loss of volume). The "missing" material from the hole is just ice.

    Perhaps it was historically a lake, not unlike some of those others in the area but froze and became covered in topsoil but recently something has caused the ice of that frozen lake to move upward.

    Either that or when the aliens landed they needed a source of water so they dug a well.

  50. WereWoof
    Happy

    The answer is obvious. It was caused by Thunderbird 2`s Mole.

  51. dsuden

    Global warming, of course!

    If I were to believe the reports these days, I might be persuaded that EVERYTHING is the result of global warming. It's stunning how far this has gone. It's permeating our entire culture.

    I would be willing to wager that you could take any phenomenon, natural or otherwise, provide it to a greenatologist, and he/she would handily produce a half dozen ways it could be directly related to global warming.

  52. capngloval

    "An explosion is a rapid increase in volume and release of energy in an extreme manner, usually with the generation of high temperatures and the release of gases." -Wikipdeia

    So this was an explosion, all be it not a human made one.

  53. Paul Herber Silver badge

    This hole is an artifact of the birth of a new Russian leader, out of the earth of Mother Russia to take control of the Kremlin. The current leaders won't rest until thay have found something to Putin the hole.

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon