Turkmenistan's quest to triple its already copious gas reserves has a fiery new focus: a flaming pit in the middle of the Karakum Desert.
A gaping crater dubbed "Hell's Gate" has been spewing flames and smoldering in a remote part of the isolated Central Asian nation since a Soviet-era drilling accident nearly 40 years ago.
It has attracted some of the few foreign tourists who travel to Turkmenistan -- and hundreds of thousands of hits on YouTube videos such as here .
Now it has caught the eye of President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov. He visited the crater this week and ordered local authorities to look for ways to get rid of it or ensure it would not hinder the development of nearby gas fields, state television in the tightly controlled nation reported.
Berdymukhamedov said that "existing anomalies have hindered the accelerated industrial development of the subsoil riches of central Karakum," according to the report.
The crater, about 60 meters (yards) wide and 20 meters deep, appeared in 1971 when the ground caved under a drilling rig and exposed a methane-choked cave. Soviet geologists decided to burn off the gas and it has been burning ever since.
Turkmenistan, which produced about 75 billion cubic meters (bcm) of gas a year, wants to triple output in the next 20 years to boost export revenues and expand sales beyond Russia, China and Iran to Western Europe, India and Pakistan.
Al Gore is heading there to arrest the crater...
I don't know why these people cannot see that they have free energy sitting right in front of their faces. Even a modest attempt at harnessing the energy being released by this crater would reap huge rewards and profits...
We have a situation like this here in the USA in Centralia, PA, where a coal fire has been burning underground since 1962. Why they have not harnessed the thermal energy from this is puzzling as they could generate alot of energy from it???
Call John Wayne and the Hellfighters!
wow, this is wild, been burning nearly 40 years? how have they not made this a tourist attraction?
to "make it go away" they would have to completely deplete the fuel source. I don't think dumping dirt or sand on it will do the trick. I am envisioning a propane heater burning away except it's methane.
Reminds me of a night spent lighting farts in the dorm at college.
...how have they not made this a tourist attraction? OR a BBQ pit??? The hell with hot dogs and marshmellows; toss some pig and full racks and open up a restaurant!
lol-contact BP. im sure they can figure out how to contain it real quick :)