Inside Siberia's 'megaslump' – and why it is getting bigger
The 'eerie sinkhole' is rapidly expanding and climate change is the reason why
It has been called everything from the "gateway to the underworld" to a "tadpole-shaped gash" – and it's eating into the surrounding landscape "like a living thing".
The huge crater in Siberia is an "immense fracture" in the depths of the Russian Far East that "splintered open" just a few decades ago, said IFL Science. Now, "with climate change continuing to cook up this part of the world, the literal scar on the planet is continuing to grow".
The 'gateways to the underworld'
Officially known as the Batagay (also spelled Batagaika) crater or megaslump, the crater was first spotted on satellite images in 1991 after a section of hillside collapsed in northern Sakha in Russia.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
A megaslump is a vast expanding depression in the Earth's surface. These deep craters "appear like gateways to the underworld", said Treehugger. These "eerie sinkholes" are the result of melting permafrost – the frozen soil and rock that makes up the majority of the Arctic landscape. As our planet continues to warm, the permafrost thaws and the Earth "loosens and slumps".
The Siberian collapse revealed layers of permafrost, within the remaining portion of the hillside, that have been frozen for up to 650,000 years. In 2017, the megaslump was measured as up to 100 metres (328 feet) deep and around one kilometre (0.6 miles) long, but it has continued to grow.
A new study suggests its cliff face, or headwall, is retreating at a rate of 12 metres (40 feet) per year due to permafrost thaw. The collapsed section of the hillside, which fell to 55 metres (180 feet) below the headwall, is also "melting rapidly and sinking as a result", said Live Science. In other words, the megaslump is "slowly encroaching upon the landscape like a living thing", said Treehugger.
Locals in Siberia have mixed feelings about the unusual chasm, said Yahoo News. Many "fear" it "due to the strange ‘boom’ sounds it emits". But others have chosen to explore the site.
"We locals call it 'the cave-in'," local resident Erel Struchkov told Reuters last year, as he stood on the crater's rim. "It developed in the 1970s, first as a ravine. Then by thawing in the heat of sunny days, it started to expand."
All of this means that Siberia "boasts perhaps the largest thaw slump on the planet", said the BBC.
'Sign of danger'
The slump's expansion is "a sign of danger", Nikita Tananayev, lead researcher at the Melnikov Permafrost Institute in Yakutsk, told Reuters. The soil beneath the slump contains an "enormous quantity" of organic carbon that will release into the atmosphere as the permafrost thaws, further exacerbating the planet's warming.
That carbon is "mostly in the form of the frozen remains of plants and other organic material", along with "methane that has become trapped inside ice crystals", said the BBC.
With an "increasing air temperature" we can expect the crater to be "expanding at a higher rate," Tananayev said, and "this will lead to more and more climate warming in the following years".
But there is a positive too, Julian Murton, of the University of Sussex, told Yahoo News. Layers of soil going back 200,000 years have been exposed by the collapse – and the scientific community hopes that studying the crater may offer fresh insights into climate change.
Create an account with the same email registered to your subscription to unlock access.
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Chas Newkey-Burden has been part of The Week Digital team for more than a decade and a journalist for 25 years, starting out on the irreverent football weekly 90 Minutes, before moving to lifestyle magazines Loaded and Attitude. He was a columnist for The Big Issue and landed a world exclusive with David Beckham that became the weekly magazine’s bestselling issue. He now writes regularly for The Guardian, The Telegraph, The Independent, Metro, FourFourTwo and the i new site. He is also the author of a number of non-fiction books.
-
25 of America's most unexpectedly banned books
In Depth From 'Harriet the Spy' to 'Little Red Riding Hood,' these books have all fallen afoul of censors
By The Week Staff Published
-
'Customers can have any car they want as long as it's electric'
Instant Opinion Opinion, comment and editorials of the day
By Justin Klawans, The Week US Published
-
Why is Mexico City running out of water?
Today's Big Question Climate change and bad planning bring on 'Day Zero'
By Joel Mathis, The Week US Published
-
Fish around the world are shrinking
Under the Radar Smaller fish in a very, very big pond
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published
-
What are rogue waves and what causes them?
Under The Radar Once dismissed as mythology, the 'giant colossi' are now taken very seriously
By Chas Newkey-Burden, The Week UK Published
-
The biggest climate records in the last year
In Depth The number of records set in the past year is a stark reminder of the destructiveness of climate change
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published
-
Universal donor blood is 'close' to reality
Under the Radar Scientists identify 'cocktail' of enzymes that destroy harmful antigens
By Rebecca Messina, The Week UK Published
-
What is NASA working on?
In Depth A running list of the space agency's most exciting developments
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published
-
Melting polar ice is messing with global timekeeping
Speed Read Ice loss caused by climate change is slowing the Earth's rotation
By Peter Weber, The Week US Published
-
Climate change is driving Indian women to choose sterilization
under the radar Faced with losing their jobs, they are making a life-altering decision
By Theara Coleman, The Week US Published
-
The hot controversy surrounding solar geoengineering
under the radar Solar geoengineering is feeling the burn
By Devika Rao, The Week US Published