For those who have ventured to Siberia in their lifetime, you know that there is a mysterious air about the desolate arctic tundra plains. But earlier this summer when a giant sinkhole was discovered in northern Siberia's Yamal Peninsula, researchers realized just how strange it may be.
In early July, oil and gas technicians discovered the sinkhole while flying over the tundra in a helicopter and captured the massive crater on video, later analyzed by researchers. Originally believed to be an isolated incident, the team decided to hold off on scientific exploration of what caused the mysterious phenomenon. However, since then two additional sinkholes have appeared across northern Russia prompting researchers to investigate the fascinating discoveries.
While several theories predominate the conversation around the sinkholes, no definitive answers have yet to illuminate exactly what caused their formation. Looking to another mysterious region of the world, some researchers believe the sinkhole found in northern Siberia may be caused by gas hydrates also associated with the Bermuda Triangle. The theory of the gaping holes being caused by fossil fuel exploration seem likely, as the hole in Yamal Peninsula lies only 25 miles from the region's largest natural gas field, however, other theories include meteorite strikes, stray missiles, and even the workings of a UFO.
In an attempt to discover what is behind the phenomenon, a team of researchers from the Trofimuk Institute in Russia, accompanied by a medic and a professional climber, embarked on a mission descending to the base of the massive crater. Hoping to reveal whether meteorite particulates or gas hydrates lie at the bottom of the sinkhole, the team believes that the strange appearance of three such sinkholes is likely explainable by a similar scientific phenomenon.
"There is a version [of a theory] that the Bermuda Triangle is a consequence of gas hydrates reactions" researcher from the Trofimuk Institute, Igor Yeltsov says. "They start to actively decompose, with methane ice turning into gas. It happens in an avalanche-like way, like a nuclear reaction, producing huge amounts of gas. That makes oceans heat up and ships sink in its water mixed with a huge proportion of gas."
And it's a similar chain-reaction that researchers believe gave rise to these mysterious craters, as the summer sun heated up the Siberian ice pack earlier this July. The team of scientists from Trofimuk Institute of Petroleum-Gas Geology and Geophysics, involved in the exploration, posit that heat from below the surface attributed to geological fault lines, in collaboration with warming summer climate conditions, initiated the massive release of gas hydrates which in turn caused underground explosions.
And while lead researcher of the team Vladimir Pushkarev, with the Russian Center of Arctic Exploration, says that preliminary data points to this strange phenomenon as a plausible answer, the team waits to draw definitive conclusions until all of the data collected from the mission is thoroughly processed.
