Posted on 02/08/2006 3:52:36 PM PST by blam
Cold and Deep: Antarctica's Lake Vostok has two big neighbors
Sid Perkins
GREAT LAKES. Lake Vostok and the newly described 90°E and Sovetskaya Lakes lie beneath a kilometers-thick blanket of ice. The black square in the inset shows the outline of this satellite image on a map of Antarctica; the cross indicates the South Pole. R.E. Bell, et al.
Trapped beneath Antarctica's kilometers-thick ice sheet are two bodies of water that rival North America's Great Lakes, new analyses suggest. The geological setting of these huge, unfrozen lakes hints that they may harbor ecosystems that have been isolated for millions of years.
More than 140 lakes lie buried beneath varying thicknesses of Antarctic ice, but most of them are small and shallow, says Michael Studinger, a geophysicist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y. Lake Vostok, discovered decades ago, is the largest. It's the size of Connecticut and holds 5,400 cubic kilometers of water, enough to fill Lake Michigan.
Scientists who've drilled through Lake Vostok's overlying ice sheet to within 120 meters of the lake's upper surface have found microbes trapped in the ice (SN: 10/9/99, p. 230: http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_arc99/10_9_99/fob6.htm). The researchers view that finding as a tantalizing clue that the lake may hold a thriving ecosystem.
Lake Vostok sits in a basin that formed as Earth's crust stretched thin, a feature that had set this body of water apart from all other subglacial Antarctic lakes, says Studinger. Now, he and his colleagues have used a collage of data to depict two large subglacial lakes near Lake Vostok and to determine that they also sit in basins formed by a thinning tectonic plate.
One of the lakes is dubbed 90°E because it stretches along that longitude. The other is called Sovetskaya, after the Russian research station atop it. Although scientists knew of these two lakes, they had no notion of their sizes until they saw recent satellite images of the region, says Studinger.
90°E Lake has a surface area of about 2,000 square kilometers, about half the size of Rhode Island, which makes it the second-largest known subglacial lake in Antarctica. It probably holds about 1,800 km3 of water, more than enough to fill Lake Ontario. Sovetskaya Lake covers about 1,600 km2. Studinger's team describes the lakes in the Jan. 28 Geophysical Research Letters.
Ice-penetrating-radar data gathered during aerial surveys indicate that the upper surfaces of these lakes lie beneath 4 km of ice. A new analysis of measurements of Earth's gravitational field suggests that the lakes in some places are about 900 m deep.
The lakes remain unfrozen because heat seeps up from Earth's interior and insulating blankets of ice lie above them, says Studinger. Any ecosystems now in the lakes would have been isolated from Earth's surface for 35 million years, the estimated age of the ice sheet in that region.
Because of their great sizes, the covered lakes probably have always contained at least some liquid water, says David M. Karl, an oceanographer at the University of Hawaii in Honolulu.
"This is an important discovery," says Karl. "It shows how little we know about the Earth around us."
Ping. You like this stuff.
35 million years is a lot longer than I thought.
Drill with 9.1 brine water.
A couple of barrels of salt water ain't gonna do anything to a lack that big, even if you lost circulation.
...think Jimmy Hoffa is somewhere down there?
It might be a bigger problem, if we contaminate us.
all this talk is making me thirsty.
Antarctic stories always leave me cold.
Old punch line: "Yeah, and it's deep too!"
"These pretzels are making me thirsty..."
It would seem that there might be a lot of potential pressure under all that ice. Wouldn't breaching that cause a pretty impressive geyser?
No:
You:(1) case the hole (metal piping as you go);(2) have what is called a pressure control stack on the surface (blow out preventers and a annular) in the event you become underbalanced; and (3) most importantly, you have a colum of drilling fluid of some kind weighing down the formation (lake, in this instance) . . water being the lightest, to brine (all you'd need here), or even some sort of heavier petroleum based mud.
Yes, I am a drilling engineer.
Why are these lakes warm enough to remain unfrozen when everything else in the neighborhood is frozen to the depth of 4km?
Isn't that basin where The Thing's spaceship crashed as shown in the movie?
and the bottom's sandy.
Loaded with bacteria, germs and etc.
Too bad the real author, John W. Campbell Jr., never gets much credit for his original pulp story "Who Goes There?" It was in the great 1930s style of purple prose and bodice-ripping BEMs (Bug-Eyed Monsters) but Lordy I loved 'em!
The 1950s movie version did something revolutionary for the time. It only showed scary glimpses of the alien monster (aka 'Marshall' James Arness) and built suspense until the final confrontation when the Thing was at last revealed.
Heating from below; areas where the crust is thinner and you've got magma nearer the surface.
Use Bentonite with their density-improver Weight-it. at an Sg of 1.6, ought to work pretty well with a column like that!
Pro-mud polymer drilling fluid is fun stuff, too, but you have to run a Ph of 13 to make it really work, and to keep the density up.
However, arent' they just drilling ice? How do you restrain the casing fdrom moving ineither direction? I can't imagine there is much skin friction holding the string.
There's a pretty extensive research program looking at how to drill these lakes without contamination; NASA is involved because the same techniques will have to be used to drill the oceans of Europa below ice.
Is't there a movie with some old guys who go do that to save the world?
"Loaded with bacteria, germs and etc."
1. I would prefer a lighter brine (salt water)
2. No, you can make it very caustic (or whatever) and eliminate the bacteria, germs, etc.
Or just boil it under pressure.
"However, arent' they just drilling ice? How do you restrain the casing fdrom moving ineither direction? I can't imagine there is much skin friction holding the string."
1. No more or less mobile than drilling in sand, probably less so.
2. You can cement the lining in compressed ice. The russians do it all the time (or so I've been told).
I'm not trying to be mysterious..I just don't want to ruin it for anyone who hasn't read the story...you shouldd be able to find it in any good SF anothology...if anyone wants the answer..just FReepmail me..regards''
"Use Bentonite with their density-improver Weight-it. at an Sg of 1.6"
You could, but why be over-balanced and dump all your mud into the lake? That's a blowout waiting to happen when you dump your column!
(I'm taking like I know the bottom hole pressure, HA!)
I am 99% sure you could do this with just 9.1 brine and a 15,000 pound stack and let it become underbalanced if it wants to.
Only chickens worry about being underbalanced.
Damn, or you could just water it in place, if it's cold enough.
Either that or the HP Lovecraft novel "The Mountains of Madness" river (sea) of styx.
Good point, dumping your column at penetration is never good!
Or better yet, they could read the story:
http://thenostalgialeague.com/olmag/bates.html
Michael Field in Auckland
Agençe France-Presse
Wednesday, 20 August 2003
The cryobot ice submersible, bound for Jupiter's moon, Europa, which scientists would like to test in Lake Vostok (JPL)
Plans to drill into an ancient lake deep under ice in Antarctica may lead it to erupt in a massive geyser-like explosion, scientists have warned.
Lake Vostok in Antarctica has spent 15 million years under 4 km of ice, its waters sealed off from air and light for all that time under the tremendous pressure of the continental ice sheet. The 14,000 km2 lake, about 1,300 km from the South Pole, is one of the world's largest and scientists believe that it could offer unique research opportunities.
But despite opposition from environmentalists who fear drilling into the lake could destroy it, Russian scientists plan to cut through the ice until they come close to the surface of the lake.
U.S. scientists are also interested in drilling into the lake to see if any life forms can exist there, a finding which could lend weight to theories that life exists in other extreme environments such as other planets.
But these projects may be set back by a scientific paper in the latest issue of the journal, Geophysical Research Letters.
Dr Chris McKay at the NASA's Ames Research Centre in California warns that whoever drills into Vostok will have to be extremely careful.
He said the high gas concentrations believed to be present in Vostok "may result in a vigorous gas-driven flow if lake water is brought to the surface. "
He said the concentration of pent-up nitrogen and oxygen in lake water, under a pressure of 2.5 litres per kg, is about equal to that of "an unopened can of Coca Cola".
Burst like a can of soft drink
"The effects of rapid degassing of Coca Cola are well known," McKay said, adding that like the soft drink, the lake can be opened, but very carefully.
"Our research suggests that U.S. and Russian teams studying the lake should be careful when drilling because high gas concentrations could make the water unstable and potentially dangerous," McKay said. Research indicates the oxygen levels in lake water may be 50 times higher than the oxygen levels in ordinary freshwater lakes.
"Lake Vostok is an extreme environment, one that is super-saturated with oxygen," he said. "No other natural lake environment on Earth has this much oxygen."
Research also suggests that organisms living in Lake Vostok may have had to evolve special adaptions, such as high concentrations of protective enzymes, to survive the lake's oxygen-rich environment. Such defence mechanisms may also protect life in Lake Vostok from oxygen radicals, the dangerous by-products of oxygen breakdown that cause cell and DNA damage.
A satellite photo with Lake Vostok highlited
In 1957 the Soviet Union erected its first Antarctic base at Vostok, in part of the territory claimed by Australia. Only in 1994 did they realise they were above a lake equal in area to Lake Ontario, on the border between the U.S. Canada, but up to four times as deep.
The Soviets drilled 3.62 km into the protective shell of ice, but stopped when poised a just few hundred metres above the liquid water. When they pulled out core samples, they filled the hole with kerosene and freon to keep it from collapsing.
Dr David Karl, an oceanographer of the University of Hawaii said the sample, which is still at Vostok, was so clear "you could read a newspaper through this ice core. This is the best sample we have of the open lake, at least until the point the ice is drilled."
Intrusion into unique environment
But some scientists are concerned about intrusions into such a pristine environment. "It doesn't know anything of human beings, fossil fuels or plastics," said Dr Robin Bell, a geophysicist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, speaking about the lake. "It is a window into life forms and climates of primordial eras."
Environmenatlists have also voiced objections. The Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition, a U.S. group based in Washington, called for a moratorium on drilling into Vostok. Any new technology to drill should first be tested on any of the 70 other lakes in Antarctica, they said.
The biggest push to explore the lake comes from the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the its leading space studies centre, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, both of whom want to study the internal environment of Lake Vostok in preparation for a mission to Jupiter's icy-encrusted moon, Europa.
The New Zealand-based Royal Forest and Bird Society is also opposed to the drilling. "It does seem strange to us that in order to find life on another planet they want to drill into Lake Vostok and contaminate it," the society's Barry Weeber said.
Julie Palais, glaciology program manager for the US National Science Foundation's Office of Polar Programs, said it may take more than a decade for drilling to happen.
"As a scientist you don't want your gravestone to read that this is the person who contaminated one of the last frontiers on the planet," she said.
So that's where the freon came from that caused the hole in the Ozone layer over the south pole.
Those are nothing pressures.
The oilfield deals with far more.
This is a zero issue.
Very cool. Went to school in West texas....Great BBQ brisket. ( Which I cook here in California) Thanks for the info.
For the more recent horror movies ( late 20th century ), that one is a gem.
Sounds like the good doctor would not last too long on a type B or C perforating crew.
How badly they want to drill into that lake, but to do so would contaminate the water.
Many thanks...BTW..have you read it?
My uncle, John Campbell, wrote the short story the film, The Thing, is based on. He wrote science fiction short stories for 3 cents a word while at MIT, paid his own tuition, but eventually flunked out because he was too interested in writing to go to class!
Oh, I know some rigs, hands and companies that could screw it up proper.
Sounds like the good doctor has never had natrual gas come out of solution bubble up and blast a column of fire a couple hundred yards in the air for a day or so off the diverters as the whole rig floor shakes.
He needs to grow a pair.
I did a long time ago, and just re-read for old time sake.
Still very good.
"Oh, I know some rigs, hands and companies that could screw it up proper."
Been to Oklahoma or Louisiana, I see.
Me and Paterson Drilling (I pick the crew and rig) could do this on turn-key.
To a topic from 2006, a link to a topic from 2003. :’)
Warning: Well in Antarctica may pop like a can of Coke
Knight-Ridder Tribune News | August 14, 2003 | Joshua L. Kwan
Posted on 08/14/2003 11:46:58 AM EDT by Dog Gone
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/964070/posts
http://www.solcomhouse.com/antarcticicesheet.htm
http://www.solcomhouse.com/170953main_SubglacialLakes_Nature_lg.jpg
Not only did the scientists find four new lakes, they discovered that the lakes coincide with the origin of tributaries of the Recovery Glacier ice stream. Upstream of the lakes, the ice sheet moves at just a few feet a year; downstream the flow increases to a third of a mile each year. The research team concluded that the lakes provide a reservoir of water that lubricates the bed of the stream, which speeds the flow of ice, and prevents the base of the sheet from freezing to the bedrock.
http://www.solcomhouse.com/170956main_SubglacialLakesVostok_lg.jpg
WHAT!? Don’t tell me the ice melts from the bottom not the top!
:’)
Wow! I love this stuff.
BUMP for great posting.
“When they found Carbone in the meat truck, he was frozen so stiff it took them two days to thaw him out for the autopsy.” This will take longer.
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